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LIVES OF ILLUSTRIOUS 

WOMEN OF ENGLAND 

OE, 



CONTAIN ING 



MEMOIRS OF EOTAL, NOBLE, AND CELEBRATED 

BIITISE filllLli 

OF THE 

PAST AND PRESENT DAY. 

' BY J. TILLOTSON. 



EMBELLISHED WITH EINE STEEL PLATE PORTRAITS. 



PUBLISHED BY THOMAS HOLMES, 

GREAT BOOK ESTABLISHMENT, 

7 6, ST. PAUL'S CHURCH- YARD. 



• T 

Ts 



W. J AND J. SEARS, PRINTER, IVY LANE, ST. PAUL'S. 



CONTENTS. 











PAGE 


QUEEN YICTOEIA 








1 


MES. ELIZABETH FEY 








. 28 


QUEEN ELIZABETH . 








. 41 


JOANNA BAILLIE 








. 65 


LADY ■ JANE GEEY . 








. 70 


PRANCES BUENEY 








. 85 


, ANNE BOLEYN 








. 93 


THE DUCHESS OF KENT . 








. 109 


HANNAH MOEE 








114 


QUEEN ADELAIDE . 








. 126 


MES.> S. C. HALL 








. 130 


MAllY, QUEEN OF SCOTS . 








136 


LADY MOEGAN 








. 160 


COUNTESS OF BUCKINGHAMSHII 


IE 






163 


, LADY GEIZEL BAILLIE 








166 


JANE SEYMOUE 








179 


MES. PIOZZI . 








185 


THE COUNTESS OP COVENTEY 








193 


CHAELOTTE SMITH . 








196 


QUEEN CAEOLINE . 








208 


LADY EACHAEL EUaSELL . 








217 


LADY GEOEGIANA EUSSELL 








247 


LADY HUNTINGDON . 








250 


» MES. HEMANS 








265 // 


MES. BUNYAN 








274 


LADY A. GOWEE . . 








288 


KATHEEINE PA^E . 








290 



i?l3 



P E E F A C E. 



In uncivilized nations, and in the early ages of society, tte 
position wliicli woman occupied was that of absolute slavery. 
On her devolved the hardest labour, and the most degrading 
toil; she carried wood, drew water, planted, and reaped, 
without intermission, and without hope. Man, the most 
powerful, employed his strength in warlike exercise when 
fighting was the order of the day ; and when he had no busi- 
ness of that kind on hand, he passed his time in idleness or 
sport. Even among the Jewish people, the practice of poly- 
gamy, and the facility of divorce, became the bane of domes- 
tic happiness, and Malaclii remonstrated with them for dealing 
treacherously with the wives of their youth. Women, by the 
ancient world, were not regarded as a part of polite society. 
Greece with all its wisdom — Eome with all its glory, con- 
ferred no blessing upon woman. The wife might be discarded 
or retained at pleasure. Cicero dismissed his wife, after 
thirty years of wedded life, on the ground that she was 
peevish and expensive. As a daughter, a wife, and a mother, 
woman was doomed to incessant drudgery, and a state of 
rigorous tutelage. But from the beginning it was not so. 

The past history of the world abounds with instances of 
woman's heroism, intelligence, and perseverance. Her in- 
fluence, whether for good or evil, cannot be over estimated. 



VI ' PREFACE. 

In forming the minds of the young, the destiny of the future 
is involved ; and to a mother's teachings and a mother's love 
this important work is committed. Her influence is now 
felt and acknowledged. But to Christianity alone the change 
is to be attributed. The light " which lighteth every man that 
cometh into the world," has shone with peculiar brilliancy 
upon woman, exhibiting her character in its truest dignity, 
and adding fresh lustre to her wisdom and her worth. 

From the numerous array of distinguished females which 
adorn the history of our country, some few have been selected 
as specimens of the whole ; and in the following pages an 
attempt has been made to present to the reader the most in- 
teresting and instructive memoirs of eminent British women. 
From all ranks of life selections have been made. Not alone 
beneath the gilded ceilings of a palace, have true virtue, noble 
daring, high-souled excellence, been sought — there they have 
been sought successfully ; but in the humble cottage, beneath 
the lowly roof of penuiy, the same great principles have been 
found. Like the air which circulates, free, pure, and health- 
ful, in stately mansions, and in cotters' homes — that in its 
great catholicity belongs to all, to peer and peasant — virtue 
and excellence are a common prize which all may strive for, 
and which all may win. And in the selection that has been 
made, nothing of party creed in politics or in religion has 
been permitted to sway the balance. An effort has been 
made to look impartially at the great ones whose lives are 
here recorded, and by the power of a sympathetic imagination 
to feel as they felt, to see as they saw, and to bear in mind 
the grand leading activities of their time. And the characters 
chosen are those which are chiefly of a representative charac- 
ter, or those which bring out the distinguishing features of 
woman in various stations of life or fortune. 



PREFACE. VU 

Our gracious Majesty, tlie Queen, uniting in her person the 
amiable qualities of wife and mother, with the profound policy 
which should ever characterise a potent sovereign, teaches us 
how regal splendour is untarnished by domestic sympathy ; 
and how the virtues which do honour to the peasant can add 
new glory to a queen. Elizabeth, the good Queen Bess, the 
masculine heroine, wdth " the heart and stomach of a king," 
is the type of another class ; a class we trust that has passed 
away for ever. Lady Jane, the twelve-days' monarch, the 
sacrifice offered on the altar of ambition, — Anne Boleyn, the 
gentle Lady Anne, so loved, so hated, — Jane Seymour, so 
wise, and so discreet, but so short lived, — Mary, the Queen ^^ 0^.. %. 
of Scots, the beautiful Mary, so happy in the court of France, , : '- . 
so wretched in her northern country, and caged, and . .. * , 
doomed, and killed, in Engiand, — and Katherine Parr, the 



■^r^. 



discreet Kate, who saw the last of the six-wived monarch, all 
queens, but all unlike each other ; not more unlike in outward 
form, than in their hearts and minds. Among the noble of ^^(^vk^^^^^ > 
the land, doubly noble, noble by birth and character, the 
history is traced of Lady Eussell, who pleaded for her lord 
as only wife could plead ; and Lady Huntingdon, the founder /mJLM^"*'^ ^/^ 
of the sect which still bears her name, and attests the excel- RcJtCq * 
lence of this noble woman ; and the witty, somewhat tuft- — -^ — ^ 
hunted Lady Morgan, who dearly loved this Yanity Eair of 
ours ; and Lady Grizel Baillie, heroic in her highland home — 
heroic amid calumny and reproach — and heroic in her poverty; 
and ladies of high birth, and higher excellence, whose private 
virtues give glory to their glory — the lives of these are told. 
In plain Quaker garb, Mrs. Ery pursues her course of chris- 
tian benevolence — a female Howard, and Joanna Baillie, 
and Hannah More, and Mrs. Hemans, and other writers of 
distinguished merit have their places ; and the simple stoi7 



Vlll PREFACE. 

of Mrs. Bunyan is not forgotten ; she who pleaded, nobly as 
my Lady Eussell, that her husband might be free, and cheered 
him in his prison-house, as he tagged laces for bread. 

So with these few words of preface, the book is commended 
to the reader, with the hope, that while the mind is interested, 
the heart may be improved, and that the " foot-prints in the 
sands," which the eminent of past time have left, may sug- 
gest, encourage, quicken, console, and cheer, and lead onward 
to that goal which is starred and luminous. 

J, TILLOTSON. 



QUEEN VICTORIA. 



There is a certain sort of language which is commonly 
applied to all sovereigns. This is the phraseology of adula- 
tion. There are no spots on the sun of the royal firmament. 
The one-eyed princes are always to be painted in profile. 
There is a divinity doth hedge a king that makes it a species 
of sacrilege to criticise defects. But these words of eulogy 
very often subside into unmeaning commonplace, and become 
as worthless as the old eastern salutation, " king, live for 
ever !" The censor speaks with bated breath, and Charles II. 
— a graceless libertine, as candid folk are wont to call him — 
becomes our *'most religious king." The vices of royalty 
are compensated by its graces, — the language of flattery only 
may fall on the regal tympanum ; all cynicism is banished 
from palace precincts to dwell with Diogenes in his tub. But 
wholesale praise, undiscriminating eulogy, stereotyped glori- 
fications, lose their value, and thus the true homage of true 
hearts to true worthiness is sometimes mistaken. When the 
voice of praise is but the voice of truth, the truth is regarded 
as simple compliment. In the illustrious lady, a sketch of 
whose past history we purpose giving here, this is especially 
the case. 

" A thousand claims to reverence close 
In her, as mother, wife, and queen." 

But in employing the language of respect, esteem, and homage, 
we do so, not because royalty can elevate and dignify virtue, 

B 



2 QUEEN VICTORIA. 

but because virtue of the highest character dignifies royalty in 
the person of our most gracious sovereign lady, Queen 
Victoria. 

Her reign has not been remarkable for stirring incidents. 
In her career there has been nothing of the marvellous. 
Sunny skies have been over her, flowers have decked her 
path ; the affection of her people has been her best safeguard, 
and never v^ras the homage of a nation rendered to one more 
worthy of all praise. Never did the royal diadem rest on a 
fairer brow ; never was enthroned in England so much that 
commends itself to the hearts of all ; never was monarch 
more entitled to all honour ; never was the love of a people so 
universal and so great. Too often royalty is but another 
name for trouble and disquiet. 

" Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown." 

Too often the adulations of a multitude are but a hollow 
mockery, and the hand that holds the sceptre sometimes 
shakes and trembles when the plaudits are the loudest, and 
palace walls re-echo to the shout. Elizabeth enjoyed no real 
and solid happiness, Mary died heart-broken, but Victoria 
dwells in a region of purity, of love, and joy. Never was 
throne more radiant with truth and justice ; never were such 
light and happiness shed over palace courts. Victoria is not 
alone the queen of England, she is the queen of English 
hearts. Her sympathies are not confined to peering nobles, 
but extend to the toiling craftsman and the humblest peasant, 
and never had country a brighter or more perfect example of 
all home duties, and all social virtues, than is to be found in 
the private life of her Majesty. 

Far away stretches a long line of ancestry, eminent for 
wisdom, policy, and courage. Clearly and distinctly it 



QUEEN VICTORIA. 3 

reaches to "William the Norman conqueror, and further still in 
England's earlier history, before the feet of Norman soldiery 
had pressed her shores, and the people of our happy isle were 
swayed by the mild government of the Saxon kings. 

His Majesty George III. was blessed with a numerous 
family. He was the father of fourteen children. His eldest 
son George, Prince of Wales, who, in consequence of a severe 
mental affliction in his royal parent, had for a long time 
reigned as Prince .Regent, succeeded to the throne in 1820. 
By his marriage with Queen Caroline he had one daughter, 
the Princess Charlotte, who, about a year after her union to 
Prince Leopold, died, with her infant child. George IV. had 
therefore no heir to succeed to his honours, and on his death 
his brother William, Duke of Clarence, was proclaimed king. 
William died childless. The next heir was the Duke of Kent ; 
but he had died about eighteen years before the death of 
William, leaving one child, an infant daughter only a few 
months old, the heir to all his honours. This was Alexandrina 
Victoria. She was born on the 24th of May, 1819. 

The childhood of the princess, who, on the death of her 
father was immediately recognised as the future queen, was 
passed under the guardianship of her mother, the Duchess of 
Kent. To her devoted maternal solicitude England owes 
much. A mother's influence and a mother's teachings have 
fitted Victoria for that high position which she so ably 
occupies. The governess selected for the princess was the 
Baroness Lehzen, a friend and companion of the duchess, and 
one better fitted for the important duties of her position could 
hardly have been found. In her early years Victoria was a frail 
and delicate child ; and yet extremely active in all her habits, 
of an inquiring mind, a joyous temperament, fond of all sports 
and games. She was an ardent lover of nature. When 



4 QUEEN VICTORIA, 

scarcely able to articulate she called her uncle Clarence to the 
window, to notice the beauties of an autumnal sunset. Young 
as she was, she saw in those varied tinted clouds that, like 
some fairy land, stretched out in red and gold and purple, a 
something grand and holy ; for it is true, as the good German 
says, " the sublime is the temple step of devotion." 

The excitement of the public mind was very great, when 
the news was made known that the young princess had 
narrowly escaped a serious accident, if not death. Some 
boys, who were shooting birds in the neighbourhood of the 
royal residence, broke the windows of the nursery, and a shot 
passed directly over the head of the princess. God saved the 
queen. What a wondrous change for England if the young 
princess had perished ! How strangely different would have 
been the aspect of all things at this present day ; but the 
providence of One, who never slumbers, preserved to us the 
princess, and with her the peace and happiness we enjoy. 

Care was taken from the very first that the royal infant 
should he trained for her future greatness. Her cheeks 
bedewed with tears, the Duchess of Kent had mournfully 
received the Committee of the House of Commons, who, after 
the death of her husband, had presented an address of condo- 
lence. To them she had presented the unconscious babe, and 
assured them of her determination to consecrate all her 
energies to prepare her child for the distinguished situation 
she was destined to fill. And nobly the duchess fulfilled her 
promise. To educate the young princess would seem to be 
by no means an easy matter. If we are rightly informed, 
the chief feature in that education was to make her natural. 
She was not taught to be artificial, but real ; she was not 
brought up as a petted favourite, on whom no wind of heaven 
must breathe, who must be unacquainted with disappointment, 



QUEEN VICTORIA. 5 

and behold all things under a sunlit aspect, whose life the 
fates had spun — 

" Out of their softest and their whitest wool ;" 

but so that she might be prepared to encounter the trials to 
which all are exposed, whether they dwell beneath gilded 
ceilings or thatched roofs. Much attention was paid to her 
physical culture, and she was inured to hard study, and 
habituated to constant industry. She was not secluded from 
the gaze of the public, but was accustomed to take her walks 
and rides where she could be seen, and where she could see. 

The Bishop of Salisbury, the Archbishop of Canterbury, 
and the Bishop of Lincoln, aided in the education of the 
future queen. At the age of nine years the princess had 
made considerable progress in the ordinary branches of polite 
education. She could understand the French, Italian, and 
German languages. But her penchant was evidently for the 
fine arts, more particularly music, for which she displayed 
considerable taste from her earliest childhood. We are told, 
on one occasion, the first we believe of the kind, when Beetho- 
ven's celebrated " Hallelujah to the Father" was performed 
before her royal highness, when that beautiful passage, " The 
exalted Son of God," burst upon her astonished ear, she 
manifested very great emotion. For several minutes after 
the conclusion of the chorus, her royal highness seemed 
spell-bound, as though a new theory had suddenly been 
propounded to her imagination ; and it was not till the 
expiration of some minutes, during which she seemed insensi- 
ble to all around her, that she was able to give expression to 
her feelings of delight. 

But though people may love music, they may grow very 
weary of the dull monotony of acquiring its practical use. So 

B 2 



QUEEN VICTORIA. 

it was with the princess. When she first commenced taking 
lessons upon the pianoforte, she was under the necessity of 
devoting much time, many very long and very weary hours, 
to acquire the art of fingering. To cheer her in this dreary 
work — and any body who has tried it must know very well 
how dreary it is — she was told that all her future success, 
and all chance of becoming mistress of the piano, depended 
on her assiduity in this department, in strict and close 
application to these rudimental principles, 

"Then I am to become mistress of my piano, am I?" 
asked the princess. 

"Undoubtedly, your royal highness." 

" Then why cannot I become mistress at once ?" 

" Your royal highness must be aware that there is no royal 
road to music. Experience and great practice are essential." 

" Oh ! there is no royal road to music, eh ! No royal 
road ? And I am not mistress of my pianoforte ? But I will 
be, I assure you; and the royal road is this I" So saying, 
she closed the instrument, locked it, and took the key. 
" There ! that is being mistress of the piano ! And the royal 
road to learn it, is never to take a lesson till you feel disposed." 

Those who were present laughed at the ingenuity of the 
princess, in which she herself heartily joined, and resumed 
the lesson in a few minutes. 

This, and a number of other anecdotes which are related of 
her, evince that she was a sprightly and interesting child. 
At Wentworth House she was once visiting with the Duchess 
of Kent, and strolled through the beautiful gardens, admiring 
the elegant arrangement of the shrubbery, and the rainbow 
hues of the flowers. The little princess was actively running 
on in advance of the rest of the party. As she turned to go 
down a particular walk, a gardener cautioned her against it. 



QUEEN VICTORIA. 7 

" Please your royal highness, the ground is damp and 
slape," said he. 

"Slape! slape!" repeated the little princess. "And, 
pray, what is slape ?" 

"Very slippery, miss — your royal highness — ma'am." 

*' Oh, is that all?" So, regardless of the caution, she 
went skipping over the treacherous path. Before she had 
proceeded far, her foot slipped, and she rolled down the 
declivity. She arose immediately, and the noble owner of 
the grounds, perceiving that she was unhurt, laughed 
heartily. 

"Now your royal highness," he said, "has "received an 
explanation of the word slape, both theoretically and practically." 

" Indeed I have, my lord," replied the princess, joining in 
the laugh, " and I think that I shall never forget the meaning 
of the word slape. '^ 

In quiet and retirement the princess learned the true secret 
of domestic comfort. Happy for her that her mother was so 
judicious a teacher ; happy for the nation that the development 
of Victoria's character was thus carefully watched. A mother's 
tenderness, and a mother's solicitude were ever about the 
future queen. Victoria, as she was to be queen of England, 
was educated as an Englishwoman. She was thoroughly 
instructed in the history of her own country ; its laws, its 
literature, and science. Its philosophers and poets soon 
became familiar to her ; and she wrote with ease and elegance. 
In Latin she made sufficient progress as to be able to read 
Horace with considerable fluency ; and in drawing she was 
very successful. Her constitution was in itself good, and every 
care was taken that it should so continue. She took much exer- 
cise in the open air, and soon became even a daring equestrian. 
All was unaffected simplicity, all natural, graceful, and free. 



8 QUEEN VICTORIA. 

And, v/ithal, there was much of heart-felt piety. In a letter 
describing the confirmation of her majesty, dated July 30th, 
1833, the writer says, " I witnessed a beautiful touching scene „ 
the day before yesterday, at the Chapel Royal, St. James's — 
the confirmation of the Princess- Victoria by the Archbishop of 
Canterbury. The royal family only was present. The cere- 
mony was very affecting : the beautiful, pathetic, and parental 
exhortation of the Archbishop, on the duties she was called on 
to fulfil, the great responsibility that her high station imposed 
on her, the struggles she must prepare for between the allure- 
ments of the world and the dictates and claims of religion and 
justice, and the necessity of her looking up for counsel to her 
Maker in all the trying scenes that awaited her, most impressive. 
She was led up by the king, and knelt before the altar. Her 
mother stood by her side weeping audibly, as did indeed the 
queen and the other ladies present. The old king frequently 
shed tears, nodding his head at each impressive part of the 
discourse. The little princess herself was drowned in tears. 
The ceremony over, the king led her up to salute the queen 
and royal duchesses present." 

There was one on whom, in all probability, "Victoria had 
already looked with something more than friendship. Her 
little cousin, Albert, from Germany, a handsome, noble-hearted 
boy, had become the visitor of the Duchess of Kent, and the 
fellow-student of the young princess. Doubtless at an early 
age had been sown the seeds of their future attachment, — 
attachment, which should make their after union unlike the 
generality of royal marriages, where the heart has little to do 
with the matter. Albert had now returned to Germany to 
complete his studies ; and, stretching out, before the beautiful 
girl he so well remembered, lay a glorious regal future. 

Kensington palace was her home. A. home possessing no 



QUEEN VICTORIA. 9 

architectural beauty, no grand display, but that was to her a 
very happy place. There it stands, at the extreme west of 
London, surrounded by the mansions of the nobility, parks, 
and gardens, and far removed from the din and turmoil of 
business. In its bare and rigid aspect it seems to protest 
against the advance of taste. George II. and his wife displayed 
a great predilection for this mansion. There it was, 
unconscious that he himself was ruled by his good wife, that 
monarch is reputed to have said : — " Charles I. was governed 
by his wife ; Charles II. by his favourites ; James II. by his 
priests ; "William by his partizans : Anne by her women ; 
my father (George I.) by every body who came near him — 
but who, but I, can be said -to govern now-a~ddys." From 
the fact that there her majesty was educated, and that there 
the greater part of her childhood was spent, Kensington 
Palace will undoubtedly possess unfading interest for all future 
generations of Englishmen. 

On the 24th of May, 1837, the princess attained her legal 
majority, and the brazen voices of the bells proclaimed the 
happy fact, and shouted it into the world's ear. Victoria was 
then eighteen years old. The great, the wise, the good, 
thronged the halls of the palace. Intellect and beauty did 
homage to the youthful heir of England's crown ; and thither 
came her own dear cousin, Albert — perhaps, and who can doubt 
it ? already all-and-all to Britain's future majesty. Pleasant 
it is to watch the ripening of affection anywhere, but still more 
pleasant when it is seen in those spheres from which, in com- 
mon, affection is forgotten in formality, and congeniality of 
sentiment in the policy of state. The splendour of the court, 
on the occasion referred to, was rarely equalled, perhaps never 
surpassed ; it was the prelude to the reign of England's 
Victoria, and fitting splendour welcomed in that reign. Soon 



10 QUEEN VICTORIA. 

the bells, that rang so merrily, uttered another sound, and at 
every twist of the fibrous ropes the death-knell of the king^ 
was heard : — 

" Hear the tolling of the bells — 
Iron bells ; 
What a world of solemn thought their monody compels !" 

On the 20th of June, 1837, William IV. died, and his 
niece, Victoria, ascended the throne. At five o'clock in the 
morning the Archbishop of Canterbury, with the chief nobility, 
arrived at Kensington Palace to communicate the important 
tidings to the young queen. The Premier, Lord Brougham, 
the Speaker of the House of Commons, the Lord Mayor, and 
other official dignitaries, soon followed ; and within the old 
walls of the Palace, Victoria held her first privy council. 
What a flood of mingled thoughts and feelings must have 
rushed upon her in that hour, — how must that gentle heart 
have beat at the shout " Long live Victoria," — how many 
varying emotions must have contended in her breast as she 
stood as queen among one hundred of the highest persons in 
the realm. A recent writer says : — " Painting has depicted 
it, poetry has described it, and history will record it ; but 
neither painting, poetry, nor history can do it justice. In the 
midst of the scarred veterans of war, grey-haired statesmen, 
judges of the courts, dignitaries of the church, and chancellors 
of the universities, stood this youthful maiden, with an eye 
moistened with tears, in view of the death of her beloved 
uncle, the king, and with a heart throbbing with emotion, as 
she f*^''t the responsibilities thus suddenly thrown upon her. 
All e^ v'ere rivetted upon the fragile and fairy form, the pale 
and pensive countenance of the modest girl, as she appeared 
before them, graceful and queenly in her child-like loveliness. 



aUEEN VICTORIA. 11 

And when the herald announced, ' We publish and proclaim 
that the high and mighty Princess Mexandrina Victoria, is the 
only lawful and rightful liege lady, and by the grace of God, 
Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, 
Defender of the Faith,' the timid and lovely maiden, over- 
whelmed by the scene, threw herself into her mother's arms, 
and wept with uncontrollable emotion. Her favourite uncle, 
the Duke of Sussex, drew near to her, and falling upon his 
knee, took her right hand to kiss it, and to take the oath of 
allegiance to his new sovereign. Victoria again burst into tears, 
and throwing her arms around his neck, imprinted a kiss upon 
his cheek, and sobbed out, ' Do not kneel to me, my uncle ; 
am I not still Victoria, your niece V All in the room were 
wholly overcome by this touching scene." 

Death-bells were now no longer to be heard, — " the king 
is dead." Says the witty Frenchman, " Long live the king!" 
Joy-notes were sounded forth from all the steeples ; a very 
flood of metal harmony ; ring, tug, strain ; louder, louder, 
quicker, quicker ; a great chorus of sound, shrill, sharp, 
clear, little bells, and big bells, all united for the one great 
end of doing honour to England's youthful queen. 

" Oh, from out the sounding cells, 

What a gust of euphony vohiminously wells : 

How it swells ! 

How it dwells ! . j 

On the future how it tells, 

Of the rapture that impels, 

To the swinging, 

And the ringing, 

Of the bells, bells, bells !" - i . ' 

Thousands and thousands of people thronged the streets,— 
a great ocean of life ; for the queen was to be proclaimed in city- 



12 - ' QUEEN VICTORIA. 

Streets, with all tlie pomp befitting the occasion. Troops upon 
troops of soldiers, with their bright helmets shining in the light; 
and heralds, in all the curious costume of a bygone day, and 
black crape for the monarch dead, and white bows, white as 
innocence, for the monarch living, gratified the gathered throng, 
and mighty shouts were heard, that drowned the sound of parish 
bells, high up in lofty steeples, — " Long live the queen." 

But, surrounded by the splendours of the court, her majesty 
never forgot the teaching of her early years. She quitted the 
dear home she had loved so well ; she entered on the osten- 
tatious magnificence of the regal palaces, but it was with tears 
in her eyes, tears which could not be suppressed by the 
brilliant prospect of the outstretching future. The following 
authentic fact exhibits a most gratifying feature in the 
character of her majesty. A man, named Killham, who 
served in the capacity of porter to the late Duke of Kent, had 
a daughter much afflicted and confined to her bed. On the 
evening of the king's funeral, the young woman received from 
Queen Victoria, a present of the Psalms of David, with a 
marker worked by herself, having a dove, the emblem of 
peace, in the centre, placed at the forty-first psalm, with a 
request that she would read it, and the hope that from it she 
might derive the consolation it was intended to convey. 

The queen is said to be passionately fond of children. The 
following anecdote went the round of the newspapers some 
few years since as an illustration. Her majesty commanded 
Lady Barham, one of the ladies in waiting, to bring her family 
of lovely children to the palace. They were greatly admired 
and fondly caressed by the queen, when a beautiful little boy, 
about three years of age, artlessly said, " I do not see the 
queen — I want to see the queen ;" upon which her majesty, 
smiling, said, " I am the queen," and, taking her little guest 



QUEEN VICTORIA, 13 

into her arms, repeatedly kissed the astonished and delighted 
child. 

The religious feeling of her majesty was evidenced in the 
case of a certain noble lord. Soon after she ascended the 
throne, at a late hour one Saturday night, a nobleman, 
occupying an important post in the government, arrived at 
Windsor with some state-papers. 

** I have brought," said he, '' for your majesty's inspection, 
some documents of great importance ; but, as I shall be 
obliged to trouble you to examine them in detail, I will not 
encroach upon the time of your majesty to-night, but will 
request your attention to-morrow morning.'" 

" To-morrow morning," repeated the queen, " to-morrow is 
Sunday, my lord." 

** True, your majesty, but business of the state will not 
admit of delay." 

" I am aware of that," replied the queen, " and as of course 
your lordship could not have arrived earlier at the palace to- 
night, I will, if these papers are of such pressing importance, 
attend to their contents after church to-morrow morning." 

In the morning the queen and her court went to church, and, 
much to the surprise of the noble lord, the subject of the 
discourse was on the sacredness of the Christian Sabbath. 

"How did your lordship like the sermon?" said the queen. 

"Very much, indeed, your majesty," replied the nobleman. 

" Well then, " added her majesty, " I will not conceal from 
you that last night I sent the clergyman the text from which 
he preached. I hope we shall all be improved by the sermon," 

Not another word was said about the state papers during the 
day, but at night, when Victoria was about to retire, she said : — 

" To-morrow morning, my lord, at any hour you please, as 
early as seven if you like, we will look into the papers." 

c 



14 QUEEN VICTORIA^ 

*' I cannot think," was the reply, " of intruding upon yo^ur 
majesty at so early an hour : nine o'clock will be quite early 
enough." 

" No, no, my lord, as the papers are of importance, I wish 
them to be attended to very early ; however, if you wish it to 
be nine, be it so." 

At nine o'clock the next morning the queen was seated at 
her table, ready to receive the nobleman and his papers. 

In 1838 her majesty was crowned. The splendour of that 
coronation will not readily be forgotten. It may be that this 
was far surpassed, and indeed it was, by George IV., who spent 
months in arranging the appropriate jewels for his crown, and 
the becoming shoe-ties for the royal footmen — but there was 
something in it that rendered it a far more memorable, and a 
far more gracious, spectacle. No white horse pranced in West- 
minster Hall, no herald rung out his defiance, no knight flung 
down his gage, but it needed no Dymoke to fight for the 
queen, for all hearts were her own already. It was a grand 
and solemn spectacle in that grand and solemn abbey, that has 
seen the beginning and the ending of so many monarchs, 
when, on the coronation day, the peers and peeresses of Eng- 
land were thronged within its ancient walls. The great officers 
of state, the prelates and high dignitaries assembled in the 
Jerusalem chamber (where Henry IV. died), and from thence 
adjourned to the deanery. There the regalia was committed 
to the charge of those whose noble names and high estate en- 
titled them to that high honour. , And through the crowded 
streets, all beautifully decorated, all grand and gay with flags and 
flowers, came the queen in solemn state, with all the splendour 
of a monarch, and accompanied by the representatives of foreign 
powers. Robed in queenly vestments, and gorgeously attended, 
her majesty proceeded to the choir, and grand and solemn truly 



QUEEN VICTORIA. 15 

was it as the strains of music, glory to the God of heaven, rose 
up from the assembly. We need not here detail the coronation 
ceremony — how the queen was seated on the chair of recog- 
nition, the bishops standing on each side, the peers bearing 
the four swords, the sword of state being next to the royal 
person, how the bishops carried the Bible, the chalice and 
patina, while the archbishop proclaimed aloud, " I here pre- 
sent unto you Queen Victoria, the undoubted queen of this 
realm ; wherefore all you who are come to do her homage, 
are you willing this day to do the same ?" how loud acclaims 
replied to this demand, and how the sovereign presented the 
requisite offerings, the altar-cloth and ingot of gold ; how the 
regalia was placed on the altar, and the litany read by two 
bishops ; how the oaths were administered, and the full swell 
of the choir burst upon the ear in the anthem, " Zadoc the 
priest, and Nathan the prophet, anointed Solomon king ;" how 
the queen duly attended to the other ceremonies, and sat in 
the chair of the Confessor ; how the swords were then pre- 
sented, her majesty invested with the Dalmatian robe, the 
oath delivered, the ruby ring put on the right hand, and the 
sceptre given ; how the crown was then consecrated and placed 
on the monarch's head, while the trumpets sounded, the guns 
fired, the people shouted ; how the sacrament of the Lord's 
supper was then administered, and allegiance offered by the 
assembly,; suffice it that the queen was crowned, and that 
as the crown of England rested on the youthful brow of Vic- 
toria, the cry " God save the queen " was heard within the 
abbey, within — without, a cry caught up and echoed far and 
wide ! 

Mr. Dyraoke, as champion of England, claimed his gold cup 
and cover, and his claim was granted, though the piece of 
ancient etiquette was dispensed with. The privilege of the 



16 QUEEN VICTORIA. 

championship was instituted by Eichard II., and a Dymoke 
has figured at every coronation since excepting the last two, 
and excepting also that of Edward IV. 

Present at the coronation was Prince Albert. He and his 
illustrious sire were perhaps the most popular of those who 
were gathered upon that occasion. It is more than probable 
that the marriage of the prince with her who was doubly his 
queen, was already in contemplation. When the prince re- 
turned from his Italian tour to the home of his father, the 
first thing that met his eye was a portrait of her majesty, 
which during his absence had been sent over for his acceptance 
by the queen. Then the matter began to get public. Special 
correspondents were dropping special hints, and the queen at 
last assembled her councillors and announced her intention to 
ally herself in marriage with Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg 
and Gotha. The magic circle of a wedding ring has charms 
even for royalty. "Deeply impressed," said the queen, "with 
the solemnity of the engagement I am about to contract, I have 
not come to this decision without mature consideration, nor 
without feeling a strong assurance that, with the blessing of 
Almighty God, it will at once secure my domestic felicity, and 
subserve to the interests of my crown and people." 

So in February, 1840, the queen was married. The 
ceremony was conducted in the Chapel Eoyal, St. James's ; 
the Archbishop of Canterbury officiating on the occasion, 
assisted by the Bishop of London. Amid the nation's 
joy the marriage was performed, and long be it ere the tie 
be dissolved at the bidding of one mightier than mailed 
baron or crowned king! When we think of white gloves 
all in a flutter, and orange blossoms tremulous with the 
excitement of the wearer, we are apt to associate them with 
something far different from royal dignity, but such things 



'S^ 



QtEEN VICTORIA. If 

\^ill happen even in queen's palaces, and human hearts will 
learn to love even in royal courts. 

" Hear the mellow wedding bells — 

Golden bells ! 
What a world of happiness their harmony foretells ! 
Through the balmy air of night 
How they ring out their delight ; 

From the molten golden notes, 

And all in tune, 
What a liquid diity floats 
To the turtle dove that listens while she gloats, 

On the moon! " 

And the mellow wedding bells that rang for the queen's mar- 
riage never rang for a happier union ; they had foretold a world 
of happiness, and in many, many cases, where the happiness 
was never found, for youth married to age, for union between 
May and December, between gold and poverty, between cold 
hearts that never throbbed in fond delight at one another's 
presence ; but here they rang for something that was real, and 
true, and good, and lasting ! Their liquid ditty was no idle 
love song, no perishable promise, but as true as fond affection. 
His Serene Highness Prince Albert was born on the 26th of 
August, 1819, and received the first rudiments of his education 
in the castle of Erenburg. His father was one of the nume- 
rous honorary princes with which Germany abounds. Before 
the French invasion there were three hundred of these princi- 
palities. At the congress of Vienna, however, their number 
was reduced to thirty-eight. Besides its separation into states, 
Germany was divided by Winceslaus in 1307, and by Maxi- 
milian, in 1500, into nine grand sections, called circles. Of 
these two are comprised in Saxony, Upper and Lower. In 
Lower Saxony we find Coburg Gotha, a territory not very 

c 2 



18 ' aUEEN VICTORIA. 

large, but very mucli improved since the accession of Prince 
Albert's family. It is the most southern of the Saxoii 
independent states, and is surrounded by Schwartzburg, 
Meiningen, Hildeburghausen, and Bavaria. The valley of 
the Itz forms the greatest part of its territory. The Thu- 
ringian mountains stretch along the northern boundary of 
Coburg, which is only about one-fourth larger than Eutland- 
shire, having an area of not quite 200 square miles in extent. 
Joined, however, to Gotha, the territory of the duke equals in 
size the county of Dorsetshire, having a surface of 1000 
square miles. Much of this is covered by mountains and 
forest land. As to Prince Albert's family, we may briefly 
state that some of his ancestors were noticeable men. In the 
dimness that overhangs the days of Charlemagne we faintly 
perceive a Saxon chief named Wittekind, who for thirty years 
• defied that prince's power. From him sprang the race of 
which Prince Albert is a younger son. All readers of Luther's 
life know how he was befriended by the Electors of Saxony, 
Frederick '* the wise," John '*the constant," and John Fred- 
erick, " the magnanimous." Prince Albert boasts these men as 
his ancestors. Their blood floats in his veins ; still he is 
true to the faith they held. 

Not very long after the marriage of the queen to this illus- 
trious prince an attempt was made upon the life of her majesty. 
A young man named Oxford fired a pistol at the royal lady, 
being incited thereto by some political motives. Happily the 
queen escaped unhurt. The culprit was immediately arrested. 
Other attempts were afterwards at some interval made upon 
her life by Francis and Bean, and it is especially worthy of 
remark, that although the intention of the criminals could not 
be mistaken, and England's majesty was well beloved by all — 
mercy tempered justice. In the old time attempts upon the 



QTJEEN VICTORIA. 19 

life of the sovereign brought down swift destruction on the 
oflfender. In other lands men were broken on the wheel, burnt 
at the stake, or torn to pieces by wild horses, and here in 
England a traitor's doom was terrible to contemplate. A word, 
a hint, an idle boast, in the days when good King George was 
king, would send a man to Tyburn in the Newgate cart, and 
make that most ominous of all abbreviated Latin — sus. per, 
col., a very direful reality ; aye, more than this, it would cut 
oflf the head, and quarter the carcase, and burn the heart, and 
make the most brutalizing display which legal sagacity well 
could make. But though there could be no doubt at all about 
the murderous intentions of those misguided men, in the case 
of Queen Victoria no blood was shed, and surely this tends 
highly to enhance the love of the people for her majesty. 

The popularity of the qaeen is very great, and the utmost 
enthusiasm has ever been exhibited wherever she has made 
her royal progress. To France, to Germany, to Scotland, to 
Ireland her majesty has gone amid the heartiest m^anifestations 
of applause and good feeling. A portion of nearly every year 
has been spent in the royal yacht, *' as beautiful a miniature a 
palace as ever floated on the ocean." During one of the royal 
visits to Scotland a little incident occurred which is worth re- 
lating. The graceful " Fairy," bearing the queen and the 
royal family, floated upon the bosom of a little bay, perfectly 
surrounded by innumerable boats of every kind from both sides 
of the strait, crowded with the inhabitants, eager to obtain a 
glance of the queen. Her majesty appeared deeply gratified 
with the spectacle, and responded in the most gracious manner 
to the enthusiastic plaudits of the people. One of the boats 
nearer to the royal yacht than the others was crowded with a 
gay company, and a gentleman arising addressed Lord Fitz- 
clarence, who had the command of her majesty's yacht, stating 



20 atTEEN VICTORIA. 

that it would an inexpressible source of gratification to tlie 
assembled multitude could they be permitted to see the Prince 
of Wales. The desire being communicated to the queen, she 
arose, and taking her little boy by the hand led him to the side 
of the vessel. Lord Fitzclarence lifted the youthful Prince of 
Wales on to a side seat in full view of the assemblage. A tre- 
mendous cheering ensued. The little prince dressed in the 
attire of a British sailor, with blue jacket, white trousers, and 
nor'-wester, doffed his glazed hat and bowed his acknow- 



The queen never appears so happy as when, forgetting the 
dignities of royalty, and the cares of state, she is the loving 
wife and mother, the very model of an English matron, 
surrounded by her lovely offspring. Her family consists of 
eight children. This gives to the nation the pledge of a long 
succession, and security and permanence to the present 
dynasty. But far distant be the day when England shall need 
another monarch, far distant be the day when it shall be neces- 
sary for a successor to Victoria to occupy the British throne ! 

One event will ever give tone and character to the reign of 
the queen. The short reign of the first Mary is marked with 
blood, blood shed in the name of Christ; the period during 
which Elizabeth swayed the sceptre is memorable for great 
men and great deeds, great poets, philosophers, dramatists, 
divines, great warriors, politicians, senators and lawyers, great 
victories, and great discoveries — that time is known to all as 
the golden days of Good Queen Bess ; Mary II. is associated 
with the protestant liberties of England, and with the event so 
well known as the revolution of 1688 ; the glory of victory, 
battle after battle, triumph after triumph, rests on the days of 
Queen Anne. Every reign has a character of its own. That 
of Victoria is the brightest in all England's annals. Future 



QUEEN VICTORIA. 21 

historians will have to tell in prose what the Laureate has 
already told so ably in poetry :— 

" Her court was pure ; her life serene ; 

God gave her peace ; her land reposed ; 

A thousand claims to reverence closed 
In her as mother, wife, and queen. 

She brought a vast design to pass. 

When Europe and the scattered ends 
Of our fierce world were mixed as friends 

And brethren in her halls of glass. 

And statesmen at her council met, 

Who knew the seasons when to take 

Occasion by the hand, and make 
The bounds of freedom broader yet, 

By shaping some august decree 

Which kept her throne unshaken still, 
Broad-based upon her people's will. 

And compassed by the inviolate sea." 

The Great Industrial Exhibition is the grandest event of 
modern times. It would almost seem as if the father of our 
English poetry, old GeofFry Chaucer, had foretold its coming 
in his " House of Fame." But for the real origin and 
realization of the magnificent undertaking we are indebted 
to the. noble consort of our gracious queen. Other exhibitions 
of industry had been held, but they were chiefly of a local, or 
at all events of a national character. A world-wide scheme 
was something nobler than these. It is no small thing to say 
that the note of preparation sounded first within the palace- 
walls of England, no small evidence of trustfulness in 
England's security the fact, that east and west, and north 
and south, responded to the invitation ; no small matter, that 



22 QUEEN VICTORIA. 

inventive genius and untiring industry were set in motion by 
that invitation ; and no insignificant testimony to the peaceful 
progress of our age that the Crystal Palace should be thronged 
with the world's wealth. 

A great deal of opposition was occasioned by the scheme. 
All sorts of evils were freely prognosticated. One looked for 
a plague, another for a famine, a third for a rebellion, and a 
fourth for the establishment of Roman Catholicism. But, 
notwithstanding all opposition, the committee went on with 
their labour. Prince Albert, and Her Majesty, were deeply 
interested in its success. Paxton planned, builders built, 
till :— 

" A palace, as for fairy prince, 
A rare pavilion, such as man 
Saw never since mankind began, 

To build and glaze — " 

uprose on Rotten Row. The queen had watched the 
progress of the work. She had been present as iron girders, 
and the mighty net-work spread over the green sward ; she 
had been there when arrival after arrival came pouring in, and 
the palace began to present the bright and glorious appearance 
which it afterwards fully assumed ; and when all was ready, 
and expectation was on tiptoe, and every body asked every 
body what every body thought of the great glass hive, and 
newspapers were full of on diis about the coming show, and 
books about the Olympiad of labour were advertised in every 
imaginable shape, and in bright prismatic colours caught the 
eye from afar ; then it was announced that Queen Victoria 
would in person open the Crystal Palace. It was a grand day 
when Elizabeth, with all the fire of her father Henry, addressed 
the troops at Tilbury ; it was a grand and solemn sight when, 
every year, Queen Anne went to St. Paul's Cathedral, to render 



QUEEN VICT0R14. 28 

tiianks for the victories of Marlborough ; but these occasions 
fade into insignificance when compared with Victoria in the 
Crystal Palace. Between the occasions a wondrous difference 
existed — not the difference of time and place alone, but the 
manifestation of a different spirit. Elizabeth and Anne alike 
represented the genius of war. In the great fiery words of 
Queen Bess there was something that seemed to make men 
count their manhood cheap, if they were not disposed to wield a 
lance or grasp a falchion's hilt ; and in the prayers and praises 
of Queen Anne for the victories of the great duke, there is 
nothing very holy, pure, or estimable. Victoria, in the world's 
great gathering, indicated another spirit — the spirit of peace, 
of progress, of prosperity, the spirit of homage to labour and 
to the hands that labour, and to the God who hath decreed that 
man shall eat bread in the sweat of his face. There was in it 
the promise of a new era, of a good time coining, of a period 
when the rose and the lily should be bound together with the 
silken cord of love ; when the olive branch should be upraised 
above the laurel, when, in the words of the Book, the sword 
should be beaten into a plough-share, and the spear into a 
pruning hook. 

A grand day it was when the palace was opened. A glorious 
first of May. The sun came out in more than May-day 
splendour ; and everybody that could possibly doit, so it seemed, 
hied away to Hyde park, to see the queen and her well-loved 
husband ride to the opening of the world's fair. How crowded 
were the streets, how thronged each avenue that led westtvard ; 
what hundreds and hundreds of carriages, what crowds upon 
crowds, colours upon colours, in endless variety and unceasing 
continuance ; what joyous shouts, rending the air and mingling 
with the joyous sounds of the bells that wagged and wavered 
like the world below. And yet it was not alone a grand 



^4 QtTEEX VICTORIA. 

pageant ; it was not alone a grand spectacle ; it was not alone 

the splendour of the carriages that bore her majesty and suite to 

the Crystal Palace — it was something more than display that had 

brought the throng together. It was something higher, nobler, 

better than this. For a queen to open the Crystal Palace was 

a high and noble tribute to industry. Within the walls of 

glass, where all was bright and beautiful, every thing told of 

the workman's skill — here in ores dug from the earth, treasures 

brought out of the dusky mine ; here in great glass fountains, 

here in masses of rainbow- coloured silks, here in precious 

stoneSjhere in Canadian timber, here in exquisitely-proportioned 

statues, and here in dyes and pigments, salts and acids. 

Amid all this, teaching the truth that labour is paramount to 

every thing, the royal party appeared, and at noon, on the same 

^rst of May, the great organs in the galleries swelled out the 

anthem " God save the Queen." With the voice of prayer 

and praise the Crystal Palace was opened, and the Exhibition 

was then proclaimed by sound of trumpet. 

To describe the scene is no easy task. " The occasion was 
entirely novel. Its whole character was unique. The first 
feeling was that of being overwhelmed with a sense of vastness ; 
our next an unusual ruffle of delight at being surrounded with 
such radiations of dazzling beauty, and such masses of artistic 
grandeur ; then came a dizzy admiration of the fairy-like 
enchantment, which seemed to endow one with a power familiar 
to our dreams, of gliding smoothly and rapidly over continents, 
islands, mountains, seas, blending in fantastic groups the ages 
of the past with the day that was passing, and mingling the 
spirit of the times gone by with the higher and nobler hopes 
of the times that are rapidly drawing on. The perfect solitude 
of whole regions of the building was in almost petrifying con- 
trast with the marvellous crowds of both sexes, and of remote 



A-^ 




J}ra;vyn.^ -En^nxyed' ^ Jt^Jto^^ik-- 



ip:e:ih€1SS ji©TAi 



QUEEN VICTORIA. 25 

nations that were pressing and thronging near the transept, ancf 
down the front of the nave, to witness the inauguration and 
the royal procession. As the hour of noon approached, 
the whole multitudinous assembly appeared to have settled 
down into a quiet but intense consciousness of being about to 
see something, for the first and for the last time in the heat 
and crisis of the world's civilization. Then the distant hum 
of hundreds of thousands of good-humoured people forming a 
larger company outside ; the boom of the cannon ; the blast 
of the trumpets ; the full swell of pealing organs, and a thou- 
sand voices in sweet yet thundering harmony. Then a hush 
— a solemn prayer. Then the queen leaning on the arm of 
Prince Albert, each of them leading a blooming child ; and the 
gentle and courteous loyalty with which the endless rows of 
elegantly dressed ladies and gentlemen smiled and wept, and 
waved their hats and handkerchiefs as the beautiful pageant 
passed before them, while organ after organ took up the 
national anthem. We scarcely think there was one person in 
that wonderful congregation who did not feel, for a while, that 
he was in a temple rather than a palace — the opening of the 
Exhibition was worthy of the Exhibition itself." 

We have said that before the success of the Great Exhibition 
was certain the queen felt a deep interest in the attempt, and 
anxiously observed the progress made with iron pillars and 
glass walls. As soon as it was opened, and the success was no 
longer doubtful, her majesty commenced a careful examination 
of its contents. She visited the Crystal Palace nearly every 
day. Freely conversing with the exhibitors themselves she 
heard the explanations they had to offer concerning their 
various productions. Again and again she passed through 
the multitudes when the glass hive was thronged, — a thing 
that raonarchs have not always dared to do — but Victoria, 

D 



26 ' QUEEN VICTORIi\. 

beloved by all, knows no fear, and needs no guards. 
In the gallery, on the first shilling day, with pleasurable 
emotion she watched her people, as they flowed into the broad 
transept, and long narrow nave. 

On the 9th of July, 1851, there were great doings in the 
city of London. A splendid entertainment was given by the 
Lord Mayor, in the Guildhall, in honour of the world's fair, 
and the queen was present. 

Never was queen so universally beloved. The vivas which 
attend her progress, are not the simulated plaudits of a people 
ruled by fear and force. Peer and peasant alike do homage 
to the virtue which is clothed in the royal purple ; and her 
majesty is the same ji^racious lady in the noble mansion of her 
proudest lord, and the humble cottage of some labouring 
peasant. In her journeying -through her empire the queen 
Very often visits the poor residents in the neighbourhood where 
she for a time remains. Many anecdotes are told of her 
charity and goodness, and many a prayer has been offered for 
the gracious lady, when her royal dignity was altogether 
unknown. An amusing story is told of her majesty, with her 
royal husband, and one or two of the nobility, rambling in the 
highlands, delighted with the grandeur of the mountain scenery, 
and wandering so far that at last they were glad to rest in a 
neat cottage by the way side. After partaking of some milk 
and oaten cake, and sitting for about half an hour, they arose 
to depart, but not one of them had wherewithal to pay the 
reckoning ; the queen directed one of the gentlemen to give the 
gude wife a pound ; but he had none with him, and so it was with 
the rest ; the queen burst into a laugh, saying it was truly a 
strange royal party, they had not one sovereign among the 
whole. 

The queen evinces upon all occasions the utmost firmness of 



THE PRINCESS ROYAL. 27 

character. She attends to the various busmess of the day 
with the strictest regularity. When the fire broke out at 
"Windsor Castle she exhibited no alarm, but remained close at 
hand till all danger was over. In the domestic bearing of her 
majesty, all may see, what Britons love to see, that their 
sovereign is not only their queen, but the first lady and matron 
in the land.' We must seek for the reason of the popularity 
of the queen in the manifestation of those virtues and attain- 
ments, and powers, which win no mean place for the pos- 
sessors of them in private life. 



THE PRINCESS EOYIL 

Has already given evidence of the same character and 
disposition which have made her royal mother at once so much 
respected and esteemed. She is the eldest of the family, and 
was born on the 21st of November, 1840. Her royal 
highness was baptized under the name of Victoria Adelaide 
Mary Louisa. We cannot doubt that an education superintended 
as it is by one herself so well instructed as her majesty, 
should end in the formation of a character at once pure, 
dignified, and amiable ; and we have every reason to expect 
that the princess royal, and the other royal children, will 
become a great blessing and happiness to England. Blessed 
is the court where virtue dwells, and immoveable is that throne 
which is established in righteousness. 



MKS, ELIZABETH FEY. 

THE FEMALE HOWARD. 



The name of Mrs. Elizabeth Fry is one which demands uni- 
versal respect and esteem. Her useful labours and untiring per- 
severance, her unaffected gentleness and constancy ; her unpre- 
tending piety, and zeal, need no eulogy, but commend them- 
slves to all right thinking minds. We proceed at once to 
tell the story of her life. 

She was the third daughter of the late John Gurney, of Earl- 
ham Hall, near Norwich, and was born in the year 1780. When 
very young she was deprived by death of her mother, and was 
thus, at an early age, left, in a great degree, to her own guid- 
ance. Her education included the chief branches of useful learn- 
ing, and the tenets of the Society of Friends became her religious 
principles. Her mind was remarkably emotional. She wept 
with those that wept, and rejoiced with those that rejoiced ; the 
strength of her affections and the vivacity of her manners, en- 
hanced the pleasure and soothed the cares of those about her. 
Philanthropy was the distinguishing feature of her character, 
and she soon found out that the secret of being happy one's-self 
is to make others happy, that there is a luxury in doing good, 
and that virtue brings its own reward. 

As yet she was a stranger to real religion. She was bene- 
volent, but it was not the love of Christ that constrained her. 
She was still attached to the pleasures of the world, and in the 
centre of some gay and sprightly circle appeared to discover the 
utmost enjoyment. Her attractive person, her amiable disposition, 



MRS. ELIZABETH FRY. 29 

her well educated mind, lier tenderness and affability, rendered 
Ler universally beloved, so that her society was courted and 
her companionship sought. But sickness came, and in the 
silent chamber, in the long, long v;eary hours, Elizabeth Fry 
underwent a great change. She saw the instability of all 
created good ; how the soul, made in God's image, required 
something more than earth could give, and it was then that 
she became deeply serious, and v/hen her recovery permitted 
it, and she listened to the persuasive ministry of William Savery, 
her affections were taught to flow in a new direction, and far 
above all love of human kind she learned to love the Friend 
that sticketh closer than a brother, and with those same affec- 
tions sanctified, and given fresh impulse by love to Christ, en- 
gaged more actively than ever in every work of faith, and every 
labour of love. 

In more senses than one there are thousands and thousands 
in the world who are dead while they live. We measure life 
by life's employment. It is possible to make a very short 
life of an existence extended to the duration of Methuselah's, 
and to crowd a long, long life into a few fleeting years. Those 
who exist without a purpose may be said rather to vegetate 
than live. We live when our life is spent for something, some 
mark to which we press, some object which we seek, some 
great design we contemplate. And what can be a nobler occu- 
pation than that of raising the fallen, comforting the wretched, 
saving the lost ? To sucli a purpose Elizabeth Fry devoted 
her energies. She united herself to the Society of Friends, 
adopted their plain dress, and simple mode of speech. She 
was now more than ever the comfort of the home circle ; reli- 
gion did not, as some shallow thinking people say it does, dis- 
qualify for the endearments of life. At the age of twenty 
she married Joseph Fry, of London, and settled in a coramo- 

D 2 



30 MRS. ELIZABETH FRY. 

dious house connected with her husband's business in the heart 
of the metropolis. The good daughter, the loving sister, 
makes the best wife and mother. To her widowed father, and 
ten beloved brothers and sisters, Mrs. Fry had been the source 
of unspeakable happiness, and in her new domestic relations 
she exhibited the same gentleness and tender care. New 
scenes of interest and duty awaited her. She became the 
mother of a numerous family. But she was still assiduous in 
her efforts to ameliorate the condition of her fellow-creatures. 
She was eyes to the blind, feet to the lame, and the case which 
she knew not she searched out. 

In the Society of Friends females are permitted to become 
speakers or preachers. Those who minister, say they, do so 
under the immediate influence of the spirit of God. That 
spirit, as the wind, bloweih where it listeth, and women are thus 
often led to proclaim the word of the Lord. Miriam responded 
to the song of Moses, Deborah uttered her psalm of praise, 
Hannah, in the temple, poured forth her thanksgivings, Hul- 
dah prophesied to King Josiah, Hannah spoke of Christ to all 
that looked for redemption in Israel, the daughters of Philip 
prophesied or preached, to Priscilla all the churches gave 
thanks, women were fellow-labourers with the apostle Paul, 
and when at the Pentecost, the spirit was poured forth on the 
disciples, men and women were collected together and were all 
filled with the Holy Ghost, and spake as the Spirit gave them 
utterance, so fulfilling the old prediction that in the latter days 
the sons and the daughters should prophesy. Right or 
wrong, and the objections urged from the language of the 
apostle are certainly strong, language that requires women to 
keep silence in the churches, and sufi'ers not a woman to teach 
— such is the doctrine of Quakers, and holding such doctrine, 
Mrs. Elizabeth Fry became a minister of the Society of Friends. 




MRS. ELIZABETH FRY. 31 

The funeral of her father was the first occasion when she pub- 
licly addressed an assembly, and those who heard her were 
greatly affected and edified. But her labours were not to be 
confined to the meeting-house, she had another way of preach- 
ing the gospel ; she loved the gospel, and her earnest faithful 
devotion to the cause of true charity, her self-denying exer- 
tions for the benefit of those who were this world's castaways, 
spoke more forcibly than any platform eloquence. She was 
often engaged in gospel missions to various parts of England, 
and subsequently to a large extent, in Scotland, Ireland, and 
on the Continent of Europe. 

Hospitals, prisons, and lunatic asylums were always visited 
by her when engaged in these missions. She possessed re- 
markable skill in adapting her words to the capacity of all. 
For the children at the school-house she had so pleasant and 
kind a way that their hearts leapt up with gladness ; she 
carried consolation to the sufferer stretched on the sick bed, 
and the corrupt and hardened criminal would hang her head 
and weep when the gentle tones and loving words of her who 
came in the name of a gentle and a loving master, fell on the 
ear. The leading object of Mrs. Fry, however, was the ame- 
lioration of the condition of the prisoners in our goals. Busy, 
bustling traffic was outside Newgate walls, people passed and 
repassed, each man and woman on their own errand, with hopes 
and fears, and joys and sorrows, and none thought of those 
who languished within the walls. The condition of the female 
prisoners in Newgate was frightful. That portion of the pri- 
son which was allotted to them, presented a scene of the wild- 
est disorder. Mrs. Fry heard of it. They were wretched, 
miserable, and poor, they were sunken in sin and pollution, 
all the better feelings of their nature dead within them, gam- 
bling, lying, drinking, swearing, fighting, surrounded by filth 



32 MRS. 



ELIZABETH FRY. 



and corruption ; but they were women. Mrs. Fry resolved to 
visit them. She was not to be turned from her purpose. She 
was not one of those whose charity must always be scented 
with rose water. The turnkey warned her that her purse, her 
watch, even her life would be endangered, but she resolved to 
go and to go alone. So she entered the goal, and was locked up 
with the disorganized multitude. She spoke in her dignified, 
gentle, powerful way, and as she spoke their fury was calmed 
and their attention fixed. Her visits were again and again 
repeated. She pointed out the sin and folly of their course, 
but it was not done in the spirit of fault finding ; she proposed 
to them a variety of rules for the regulation of their conduct, 
and to these they gave their hearty consent, for Mrs. Fry never 
assumed the character of patron or censor ; she was content to 
earn the name of Friend. 

Her first visit was remarkably interesting. She was shewn 
into an apartment containing about 160 unhappy women, all 
gazing upon her with the utmost amazement. 

"You seem unhappy," said Mrs. Fry, '' you are in want of 
clothes : would you be pleased if some one were to come and 
relieve your misery ?" " Certainly," they replied, " but nobody 
cares for us, and where can we expect to find a friend?" " I 
am come with a wish to serve you," she resumed, " and I think 
if you second my endeavours, I may be of use to you." She 
spoke the language of peace, and when she was about to de- 
part the women thronged around her. "You will never, 
never come again !" said they. " I will come again," she 
answered, and kept her word. 

The condition of the prisoners was truly deplorable. In 
two wards and two cells, comprising about one hundred and 
ninety superficial square yards, three hundred females were at 
that time confined- — the tried and the untried — in the eye of 



MRS. ELIZABETH FRY. 33 

the law the guilty and the guiltless were thus thronged toge- 
ther, some to pass out on a verdict of acquittal, some to die a 
felon's death. They were associated together without distinc- 
tion or classification. In these confined precincts they saw 
their friends, and kept their multitudes of children ; and they 
had no other place for cooking, washing, or sleeping. They 
slept on the floor without so much as a mat to cover them. 
The women were chiefly engaged in playing at cards or reading 
improper books, or begging at the gratings, others busily era- 
ployed in the mysteries of fortune telling, and others still more 
busy in the art and mystery of pilfering. 

They complained that they had nothing to do, and that idle- 
ness led them to sin, so that almost the first effort of Mrs. 
Fry was to provide for them employment. But great obstacles 
presented themselves. At her second visit she proposed to es- 
tablish a school for the benefit of their children. In this they 
heartily concurred ; they were wretched abandoned women ; but 
they had still something of maternal love. Mrs. Fry requested 
that they should appoint a schoolmistress. This she left en- 
tirely to them. At her next visit they had selected an intelli- 
gent young female, who behaved with signal propriety. Her 
conduct did credit to their discernment. The next was to 
obtain a place appropriate for the school. Upon the application 
of Mrs. Fry the authorities stated that they could not find any 
vacant spot suitable for her purpose, but at last an unused cell 
was discovered in which the school was commenced. A com- 
mittee of ladies was appointed, who united very earnestly in 
the benevolent exertions of the founder. All this could not 
be accomplished without great opposition. No great or good 
work ever was done without a struggle. There are always 
stumbling-blocks in the way of progress. When it was pro- 
posed to introduce some description of work, the idea was re- 



34 MRS. El^IZABETH FRY. 

garded as visionary and unpromising. Many objections were 
urged, many shook their heads and said it would inevitably 
fail, but the zealous expunge impossible from their vocabulary, 
and can do all things strengthened from on high. Mrs. Fry 
proposed to establish certain rules ; the women gave the most 
positive assurances that they would implicitly obey, and at last 
a meeting was held in one of the wards, at which the rules 
were read and put to the vote, and those of the prisoners who 
had any disinclination to any particular rule were requested 
freely to state their opinions. The rules appointed a matron, 
and engaged that the women should be employed in knitting, 
needlework, or other suitable occupation ; that everything 
conducive to immorality or profanity should be banished, that 
the prisoners should be divided into classes, and a monitor 
appointed to each class. That the greatest cleanliness and re- 
gularity should be observed ; that twice a day the Scriptures 
should be read. The rules were agreed to, and the experiment 
succeeded beyond all expectation. The Lord Mayor, the 
Sheriffs, and the Aldermen attended, and were astonished at 
the change which had taken place. What had been described 
as a " hell upon earth," now presented the appearance of an 
industrious manufactory or a well-regulated family. Mrs. Fry 
was loaded with praise, but it was not praise she sought, and 
perhaps the best eulogium that was ever passed upon her was 
the saying of a hardened criminal won to virtue by the power 
of love. — " God bless her and the day she came to Newgate ; 
she has done us all good, and we have, and shall always have, 
reason to bless her." 

But Mrs. Fry's labours extended beyond Newgate. An 
extensive correspondence was carried on between her and 
many benevolent persons in various parts of the United 
Kingdom. She sought the happiness of the unhappy, and 



MRS. ELIZABETH FRY. 35 

exerted herself to communicate that knowledge which sets the 
spirit free. Although unable to undertake the office of 
missionary to all prisons, she visited many, and personally 
originated philanthropic institutions similar to that of the 
British Ladies' Society in London. 

In Scotland the condition of the prisons was very deplorable. 
At the gaol in Glasgow she requested permission to speak to 
the female prisoners, and after some delay was allowed to do 
so. She was shewn into a large room where about a hundred 
had assembled, and taking off her bonnet, sat down in the 
front of the women. Every eye was fixed upon her. " I 
had better just tell you," she said, in her mild persuasive 
voice, " what we are come about." So she told them she had 
had to deal with a great number of poor women, sadly 
wicked, more wicked than any who were there, and how they 
had been recovered from evil, and brought back into the 
paths of rectitude. She read to them the rules, asking them 
if they approved to hold up their hands. Every hand was 
upheld. Tears were shed. Visible emotion was on every 
countenance ; and the whole fairly wept when Mrs. Fry read 
the parable of the lost sheep. Then, in her peculiarly sweet 
tones, like the voice of a mother to a suffering child, she 
prayed that the good shepherd might bring home his wander- 
ing sheep. 

Great success attended the labours of Mrs. Fry in Scotland, 
and her tour in Ireland was likewise highly beneficial. Cases 
of individual reform might be stated, being both interesting 
and numerous, but we shall not here dwell upon them. 
Christianity, the basis of all the reform which Mrs. Fry 
designed in prison discipline, is tlfe only true source of a 
radical renovation of character. In its practical and vital 
power it was brought to bear upon the minds of the prisoners. 



36 MRS. ElIZABETH FRY. 

Order, cleanliness, and industry, although positively insisted 
upon, were only regarded as the auxiliaries of the religious 
instruction communicated, and results of the happiest kind 
were repeatedly witnessed. 

Another department of usefulness to which Mrs. Fry 
directed her attention was that of the convict ships. The 
condition of those vessels was known to be bad, but inquiry 
brought to light appalling facts in connection with them. 
Under the kind and judicious suggestions of Mrs. Fry and 
her associates admirable regulations were introduced. The 
good resulting from their introduction was acknowledged 
again and again by the colonial authorities. Care was now 
taken that the women should be removed as humanely as 
possible, and not heavily ironed as had heretofore been the 
case ; that mothers should not be separated from their 
children, until those children were old enough to be weaned ; 
that proper air and exercise should be permitted on board 
ship ; that a schoolmistress should be provided to instruct the 
untaught, and that a chaplain should be appointed to see to 
the religious welfare of the convicts. They were allowed to 
take with them those little articles which are so necessary and 
useful for the voyage, and the result of it all was that the 
conduct of the women was greatly improved, and that their 
behaviour in the settlements afforded evidence of the benefit 
which they had derived therefrom. Mrs. Fry in these efforts was 
enunciating a great principle, which the English law-makers 
appeared to have forgotten, namely, that all punishment should 
have a correctional character, and should never partake of 
vengeance. Her efforts were directed to the prisoners as 
those who were morally diseased ; she regarded the prison as 
a hospital ; and to effect a cure instead of inflicting penalties 
was the great aim of her life. The system of assignment, 




Painted ^y \T. DoiaH 



^-2/ 



MRS. ELIZABETH FRY. 37 

a system near akin to slavery, and calculated to plunge tlie 
convicts deeper and deeper into disgrace and criminality, was 
discontinued. Penitentiaries were erected, where the women 
remained for six months under moral and religious instruction, 
and were then placed in service, with their own consent, and 
under certain regulations, designed to secure them as far as 
possible from falling into the hands of those who might lead 
them astray. 

*' Charity," saith the proverb, "begins at home." But it 
does not end there. The philanthropy of Mrs. Fry was 
not circumscribed by the British dominions. Foreign prisons 
were included in her benevolent regard. Bad as English 
prisons were, foreign prisons were far worse. Here there 
was indifference, there direct cruelty was practised. We give 
one or two instances. In the prisons of one of the ancient 
castles of Transylvania, the prisoners were laid on their backs 
every night, with their legs in the stocks, so that they could 
not turn. The instruments of torture consisted of rods, 
whips, sticks for bastinadoing the feet, and a heavy wooden 
collar for women. The state prison at Munich was for 
political offenders only. Tiiere one prisoner had been in 
a cell by himself six years. If a charge was made to which 
the accused could not, or would not reply, or give any expla- 
nation, they were whipped after the fashion of the torture 
question in the old Spanish inquisition. Women were fre- 
quently submitted to this cruelty. And all this before trial. 
Alas ! throughout the Austrian dominions the same unjust and 
brutalising practices are to a great extent still continued, but 
elsewhere the labours of Mrs. Fry were attended with much 
usefulness. At Paris an association of ladies was formed to 
visit the prison of St Lazare, a very large establishment were 
women only were confined. Throughout France the diligent 

E 



38 MRS. ELIZABETH FRY, 

exertions of the benevolent English lady brought about a 
great reform, and the whole system of management was 
vastly improved. At Gonda, near Rotterdam, and at Amster- 
dam, committees of ladies were formed, and the prisons regu- 
larly visited. In Germany, prison discipline underwent 
extensive alteration, and at Geneva the most important 
changes were effected. Russian prisons were not forgotten, 
and Russian philanthropy was excited and much good 
done, much that ameliorated the condition of the convicts, 
and made punishment to possess much more of a reform- 
atory character than it previously had done. The work 
of mercy was carried on in America, and the zeal of those 
who first responded to the appeal from England was heartily 
seconded by the co-operation of the authorities. 

When Mrs. Fry visited Denmark, in 1841, the prisons 
were in a very wretched condition. In one of them, the only 
portion of a Bible which could be found, was part of the Old 
Testament in Hebrew, belonging to a Jew. The countenances 
of the prisoners seemed Jto have become brutalized. The 
women were locked up in solitary cells under the care of 
soldiers. Soon, however, a change was effected. The prisons 
were enlarged, the prisoners classified, and women took care 
of their own sex. A minister was devoted to the charge of 
the spiritual care of the prisoners, and religious books were 
furnished for their instruction. 

At Paris, a refuge was formed for those who sought to 
leave a life of crime and shame. It was visited by Mrs. Fry 
in the spring of 1842, when the number of penitents, as the 
poor women were styled, amounted to fifteen. They were 
received from all parts of France, and the time fixed for 
their continuance in the institution was two years. 

The benevolent mind of Mrs. Fry was ever actively em- 



MRS. ELIZABETH FRY. 39 

ployed. In visiting transport ships she had been led to con- 
sider the arduous and self- denying labours of the coast-guard, 
and the condition of British seamen. She visited with 
peculiar pleasure the great establishments in our sea-ports. 
The naval hospitals, at Plymouth and Haslar, deeply interested 
her, but she judged those noble institutions to be incomplete, 
as they possessed no books for the use of the invalids. 
She at once sought to supply what she considered wanting, 
and to establish libraries for the use of the inmates. Her 
efforts met v/ith opposition. It was urged that the books were 
not only unnecessary but calculated to be injurious. But 
Mrs. Fry persisted in her original intention, and at last the 
Admiralty gave their consent, and books were supplied. The 
coast-guard, a noble but sadly-neglected class of men, 
attracted her attention and aroused her sympathy. She 
formed the magnificent design of supplying every station with 
a choice library of entertaining and religious books. The 
question of funds was serious. It would cost <£ 1,500 to 
supply five hundred stations. But it must be done. The 
government granted £500 ; subscriptions were obtained, and 
ere long the cherished desire of the noble-hearted lady was 
accomplished. But the matter did not end here. Books 
became essential, they were regarded as necessary to the good 
order and well-being of British seamen, and after a grave 
deliberation the Lords of the Admiralty resolved that a library 
should be provided for every ship of war. 

In the summer of 1843 Mrs. Fry spent a few weeks in 
Paris for the last time. Soon after her return home her 
health became enfeebled, and she grew so alarmingly ill that 
the solicitude of all who loved her was painfully awakened. 
In the following year she had so far recovered as to visit Bath, 
in the hope of deriving relief from its far-famed hot springs. 



40 MRS. ELIZABETH FRY. 

But the end was at hand. Her labours were still continued, so 
far as her failing health would allow, and no opportunity was 
permitted to escape her of doing good or speaking peace. When 
in 1845 she resided at Ramsgate, she was repeatedly engaged in 
acceptable religious service at the Friends' meeting-house. She 
took great pains in disseminating bibles and tracts among the 
crews of foreign and other vessels which frequented the 
harbour. " We must work," said she, " while it is called 
to-day." Daily her health declined, and it became more and 
more evident that her pilgrimage was nearly ended. On the 
11th of October, after a day or two of considerable suffering 
and debility, she was attacked with pressure on the brain. 
She sank under the stroke. Falling into a deep slumber, she 
became totally unconscious, which state, notwithstanding 
some severe convulsions, continued almost without inter- 
mission until the 13th, when she quietly drew her last breath. 
She died in her sixty-sixth year. 

Her decease produced an extraordinary sensation. A great 
public loss had been sustained. The flags were lowered half- 
mast high. The funeral took place on Monday, October the 
20th, in the Friends' burying ground at Barking in Essex. 
Though she could not be numbered with the very aged, hers 
was a LONG LIFE. Her philanthropic labours were acknow- 
ledged on all hands. She was a warm and steady friend of 
the oppressed ; earnest in every good word and work. The 
law of love was on her lips ; she was a kind friend, an 
affectionate mother, a loving wife, an ardent admirer of nature, 
a rare specimen of renovated and sanctified humanity, and 
one of whom the joyful assurance may be entertained that at 
last it shall be said, " Come ye blessed of my Father, inherit 
the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the 
world. I was in prison, and ye visited Me." 



QUEEN ELIZABETH. 



Wonderful days were those of Queen Elizabeth. Herreign 
was the era of great organic changes. Old things were passing 
away, all things were becoming new. The Elizabethan period 
forms the centre of a wide circumference. Political and eccle- 
siastical institutions were assuming a novel character, science 
and literature were developing their hidden resources, and 
while navigators discovered new lands, and philosophers uttered 
new truths, poetry came with a new and bewitching enchant- 
ment, adding fresh lustre to the golden times of the good Queen 
Bess. 

" Good Queen Bess !" echoes a crabbed philosopher ; *' and 
in what did her benignity consist ? Was not her rule a rule 
absolute ? did she not pour out the treasure of her country and 
the blood of her people ? were not her laws arbitrary, and their 
enforcement severe ? did she not shackle men's souls as well 
as men's bodies ? and did not they of other creeds roast at the 
stake and swing at Tyburn ? was she not as fickle as the 
wind, uncertain, coy, and hard to please ? did not the German 
traveller count on the bridge gate, London, thirty human heads 
blackening and rotting in the sun? and has he not recorded it, 
that all future ages may know of the tender mercies of the 
virgin queen ?" 

'* Golden times ! " saith another ; " why not iron, lead, or, 
better still, brazen times, than the purest metal that the earth 
can give? Was not the gold alloyed with baser stuff? was 
there any gold in it at all ? was it not as fanciful a gold as that 

E 2 



42 QUEEN ELIZABETH. 

of alchemical inquiry ? had it the^ true ring of metal ? was it not 
the currency of a doubtful coinage ? As to religion, were not 
wandering sheep driven into the fold of the church with 
violence and force, like sheep into the pens at Smithfield mar- 
ket ? Did not legal sagacity recognize a right divine of kings ? 
Was not literature sacrificed on the altar of patronage ? Were 
not the most extravagant stories related and believed of far- 
oif countries ? and was it not stated by the renowned author of 
the ' Novum Organum,' that a basin of moonbeans would 
cure warts ?" 

True, quite true, most potent, grave, and reverend seigniors ; 
but in all these objections there is a great principle involved, 
an hypothesis as wrong as bigotry, and something that it were 
well to challenge at once. Rightly to understand the charac- 
ters of those whom history has immortalized, it is essentially 
necessary that we be in imagination transported to the period 
at which they lived, in order that we study their biography 
with a sympathetic mind. We are too apt to regard the 
people of the past, as we do the people of the present ; to 
translate distant ages into the dialect of our own ; to measure 
antiquity by a modern standard, and to judge of characters by 
the morality and religion of the nineteenth century ; to ascribe 
motives and designs to ancient characters, which have no more 
fitness than to represent their persons in our costume. Gar- 
rick played Macbeth in a court suit with a bag wig and ruffles, 
but this could not possibly convey any idea of the Thane of 
Glamis. A Dutch painter presents us with a painting of the 
offering up of Isaac, and places pistols in the girdle of the 
patriarch, but every body knows it to be a great blunder. 
Just so it is with heroes and heroines of history, we make 
them think as we think, and feel as we feel — as Shakespeare 
makes people talk about cannon in the days of Edward the 



QUEEN ELIZABETH. 43 

Confessor ; or we condemn tliera because they did not think and 
feel then as doubtless they would now have done. Instead of 
this, we should cast ourselves into the midst of their period, 
should enter into its passions and excitements, should take into 
consideration all the surrounding circumstances, and notice 
the grand governing activities of their time. Thus viewed, the 
reign of Elizabeth, and the golden days which made up that 
period, present a new aspect. It was a period of transition. 
Society was entering on the race of intellectual and social im- 
provement. Mind was bursting its fetters. Religion was 
rising from the grave. It had been argued that an antipodes 
was impossible, that if so the people must walk with their 
heels upwards and their heads hanging down, that everything 
must be topsy-turvy, trees with their branches growing down- 
wards, rain, hail, and snow rising upward — but navigation 
had exploded these follies. Theologians had been attempting 
to solve the problem of how many angels could stand on a 
needle's point; moral philosophers were discussing the question 
whether a lie, under certain circumstances, was not truth ; 
chemical investigations were carried on to discover the water 
of immortality, and that miraculous stone which should trans- 
mute all baser metals into gold. All these things clouded the 
intellectual horizon, but they were the precursors of the morn- 
ing. We do not complain that it is not always noon-day ; we 
do not sigh over saplings, nor shed tears over buds ; we do 
not condemn the butterfly because it was once a grub, nor 
sneer at the strong man because he was once a feeble child ; 
but we have a way of condemning the past because that past 
was not so wise as the present ; we know more, we see fur- 
ther, we understand more fully ; a dwarf standing on a giant's 
shoulder sees further than the giant. 

We have said enough by way of vindication, and so begin 
our brief sketch of " the fair vestal throned in the west." 



44 QUEEN ELIZABETH. 

A gay and splendid court was tliat of Henry YIIT., and a 
gay and splendid man was that monarch; half priest, half sol- 
dier, but priest and soldier merged in the lover. His first 
marriage continued for a long, long season, until the sovereign 
heart was smitten with the charms of the gentle Anne Boleyn, 
a lady in waiting at the court, with whom he resolved to share 
his crown and dignity. There were great obstacles in his 
way, barriers that seemed almost insurmountable ; but what is 
there that can overcome a lover's ardent passion, especially 
when that lover sways a sceptre and wears a crown ? His 
first marriage was annulled. Catherine of Arragon was no 
longer queen, but then England was no longer catholic ; that 
matrimonial separation had brought about another separation, 
namely, that of England from Rome, and whereas the king 
had been employing his scholastic skill to put down the noisy 
monk of Wittenberg, he now himself began to recognize the 
teachings of the new faith. Anne Boleyn was a protestant ; 
Henry united himself to her and her faith. In 1533 a daugh- 
ter was born to him and named Elizabeth. He had another 
daughter by his former marriage, named Mary, a daughter 
who was trained and taught in Rome's discipline, as Elizabeth 
was in that of the Reformers. 

The birth of Elizabeth is thus quaintly recorded by the 
contemporary historian. Hall : — " On the 7th day of Septem- 
ter, being Sunday between three and four o'clock in the after- 
noon, the queen was delivered of a faire ladye, on which day 
the' Duke of Norfolk came home to the christening." The 
room in which the young princess first saw the light, was hung 
with tapestry, depicting the history of the holy virgins, and 
was on this account called the Chamber of the Virgins. "When 
the queen her mother, who had eagerly anticipated a son, was 
told that she had given birth to a daughter, she endeavoured 



QUEEN ELIZABETH. 45 

with ready tact to attach adventitious importance to her infant, 
by saying to the ladies in attendance: — "They may now with 
reason call this room, the Chamber of the Virgins, for a virgin 
is now born in it on the vigil of that auspicious day on which 
the church commemorates the nativity of the Virgin Mary." 
Heywood also, a zealous protestant by the way, intimates that 
the young princess was under the special protection of the 
Virgin from the hour of her birth, and for that cause devoted 
to a maiden life : — " The Lady Elizabeth," says he, " was bora 
on the eve of the Virgin's nativity, and died on the eve of the 
Virgin's annunciation, — even that she is now in heaven, with 
all those blessed virgins that had oil in their lamps." 

Jewelled crowns sometimes turn out no better than crowns 
of thorns. It was so with Anne Boleyn. A fairer than she, 
or one whose beauty seemed more fair to the royal suitor, 
eclipsed the gentle woman altogether. Anne was accused of 
the highest crimes. Adversity came upon her like a Russian 
winter. There was no hope. Courtiers, and priests, and 
lawyers, were so many marionettes in the hands of the king. 
She was tried, and condemned to be burnt or beheaded, as the 
king thought fit. He chose the latter, and the unhappy 
woman was executed in the Tower green, and sleeps the sleep 
of death in the Tower chapel. 

Elizabeth was educated in the principles of the reformed 
faith, the faith her father held, the faith in which her mother 
died. Henry united himself to Jane Seymour ; by her he had a 
son, named Edward, who afterwards succeeded to the throne. 
The numerous marriages of King Henry involved his subjects 
in great perplexity and danger, for while by one statute it was 
declared treason to assert the validity of the king's marriage 
either with Catherine of Arragon or Anne Boleyn ; by another 
it was treason to say anything to the disparagement or slander 



46 QUEEN ELIZABETH. 

of the princesses Mary and Elizabeth ; and to call them spu- 
rious, would consequently have been construed to their slander. 
Nor would even a profound silence with regard to these delicate 
points, excuse a person from such penalties. For by the for- 
mer statute, v/hoever refused to answer upon oath to any point 
contained in that act, incurred the penalties of treason, so that 
in fact every body was liable to a traitor's death ; to say any- 
thing, would give occasion for a long cord and a short shrift ; 
to say nothing, would place him in the same uncomfortable 
circumstances. 

When Henry the Eighth made his will, he bequeathed the 
crown first to Edward, then to the Lady Mary, then to 
Elizabeth ; and the two princesses were obliged, under the 
penalty of forfeiting their rights to the throne, not to marry 
without the consent of the privy council. Throughout the 
protestant reign of Edward, the boy who perished in his 
prime, Mary continued to adhere to the Church of Rome, and 
absolutely refused to observe the established form of worship. 
On this account Edward burst into tears ; but tears would not 
melt the stern lady, and as he was not suffered by his coun- 
cillors to resort to extremities, his sister still enjoyed her 
liberty of conscience. On the death of Edward, Lady Jane 
Grey, whose sad story we have to tell, was proclaimed, but ere 
many days had passed resigned the crown to Mary. Then 
came the period of persecution. Fires blazed in Smithfield, — 
fires fed by earnest-minded men who died for their faith. 
Amid all the scenes of that short and terrible reign, the Lady 
Elizabeth maintained her zealous attachment to the protestant 
religion. Mary conceived for her the most implacable hatred, 
and persecuted her with the most unrelenting cruelty. She 
had always disliked that princess on account of the ancient 
quarrel between their mothers ; and now, as the parliament 



QUEEN ELIZABETH. 47^ 

had declared in favour of Henry's first marriage, she was 
furnished with a plausible pretence for representing^her sister 
as illegitimate. 

Elizabeth was subjected to a great many insults and 
indignities. These required a considerable amount of patience 
to endure. She was ordered to take place at court after the 
Lady Lennox, and the Duchess of Sussex, as if she was not the 
legitimate issue of the royal blood ; her friends were neglected 
and discouraged on every occasion ; and her many eminent 
virtues and endowments, while they recommended her to the 
esteem and affection of the people, tended only to inflame the 
jealousy and envy of Mary, who treated her with so much 
cruelty that she resolved to retire into the country. She was 
a king's daughter, but the finger of scorn was pointed at her ; 
she possessed rare talents, but they could not disarm prejudice 
and distrust ; and while Mary only sought an opportunity to 
bring upon her utter desolation, circumstances occurred which 
gave occasion for open accusation. 

The queen was about to form a matrimonial alliance with 
Philip of Spain. English hearts were filled with dread. The 
liberty and independence of the nation were at stake, and the 
most terrible apprehensions were entertained. Rumour was 
busy. Stories were afloat of coming evil ; stories that, like a 
rolling snowball, gathered as they rolled. What would words 
avail ; what the opposition of the tongue ? Could notliing be 
done to preserve England ? The country was preparing for a 
general insurrection. Men talked of Longbeard, Lord of 
London, of Wat Tyler, and of Jack Cade. It was not the 
first time the English had revolted. Sir Thom.as Wyatt 
engaged to assemble the men of Kent ; Sir Peter Carew 
undertook to raise the inhabitants of Devonshire ; and the 
Duke of Suffolk promised to raise the Midland Counties. 



48 QUEEN ELIZABETH. 

Before the day appointed, Carew commenced the insurrection, 
was subdued, beaten, and compelled to fly ; Suffolk attempted 
to fulfil his agreement, but utterly failed ; Sir Thomas Wyatt 
was more successful. At Maidstone he issued an address 
against the queen's councillors, and condemning the Spanish 
union. The people began to flock to his standard. Many 
of those who were sent against him revolted and united 
with him ; and encouraged by these accessions he marched 
for London. It was not long ere he reached Southwark, a 
pleasant spot in those old times, with many a green and shady 
lane, and wide-extending field. To reach London he must 
cross the bridge, the one bridge, which was the boast and 
pride of all the city. The heavy gates of the bridge were 
closed, and troops were stationed there to bar his progress. 
.To cross was impossible. He directed his march to Kingston, 
and approached London on the north side ; but his troops 
were dispirited, but few additions v/ere made to their number, 
and those who were the boldest and the most rash and daring 
shrunk away from the little band. Unopposed he passed 
through Westminster, and down the Strand to Temple Bar. 
There the fighting began, a strange spot for a battle-field, and 
there the rebels were defeated, and Sir Thomas Wyatt taken 
prisoner. He was tried, condemned, and executed. But on 
his trial, so said report, he impeached the Lady Elizabeth ; and 
Mary, anxious to effect her ruin, caused her to be arrested 
and conveyed to the Tower. 

To be sent to the Tower in those old days was no light matter. 
Many high and noble ones passed under Traitor's Gate, and 
never left that.Tower again but for the gibbet or the axe. Or, 
perhaps, to linger through a long, long series of years in lone- 
some captivity, or, perhaps, within those Tower walls, to end a 
wretched life by murder. 



QUEEN ELIZABETH. 49 

" The Tower of Julius, London's lasting shame, 
By many a foul and midnight murder stained." 

There, ever since the Normans had pressed the English soil, 
black deeds and huge wrong doing had gone on. Before 
councils, whose will was law, the innocent had pleaded in vain, 
and died unpitied. There, prisoners had groaned in cold 
dark chambers, still to be seen, and known no human sympathy 
or care ; and there, the legal scribes recorded answers 
shrieked upon the rack. Doubtless Mary would have been 
well satisfied to have rid herself of her sister, as Richard did 
himself of troublesome nephews, or Edward IV. of a rebel- 
lious brother. But she dared not do it. No evidence could 
be obtained that could be at all relied upon ; the princess 
defended herself with the utmost calmness, and public 
sympathy was aroused. 

This effort having failed, it was proposed that Elizabeth 
should be united in marriage to the Duke of Savoy, so that 
she might be compelled to leave the country ; but Elizabeth 
at once refused. So, under a strong escort, she was conveyed 
to Woodstock, and there closely confined. 

At Woodstock, instead of being placed in the royal apart- 
ments, she was lodged in the gate -house, which long afterwards 
retained the name of the Princess Elizabeth's chamber. There, 
with a diamond, on a pane of glass she wrote : — 

" Much suspected of the 
Nothing proved can be, 
Quoth Elizabeth, prisoner.*' 

Sixty soldiers were on guard all day, both within and without 
that quarter of the palace where she was in ward. So sad was 
her fate that she often said a milkmaid's life was merrier than 
hers. With a piece of charcoal she wrote upon a shutter, the 
touching lines which have been preserved by Hentzner : — 



50 atJEEN ELIZABETH, 

" Oil, Fortune, how thy restlsss wavering st&te 

Hath fraught with cares my troubled wit. 
Witness this present prison, whither fate 

Could bear me, and the joys I quit. 
Thou caus'destthe guilty to be loosed 
From bands wherein are innocents enclosed j 
Causing the guiltless to be strait reserved, 
And freeing those that death had well deserved ? 
But by her envy can be nothing wrought. 
So God send to my foes all they have wrought, 

Quoth Elizabeth, prisoner," 

Another attempt was likewise made to ensnare the princess^^« 
Her attachment to protestantism was well known. To he ss 
protestant, as a witty bishop observed, v/as to savour of the 
frying-pan. Many and many a goodly show had there been 
of obstinate heretics, burning alive in Sraithfield ; and many a 
crafty means had been employed to take the unwary in the 
net. The common net at that time for catching protestants 
was the real presence ; and this net was employed to catch 
the Lady Elizaheth. She was asked what she thought of 
those words of Christ, " This is my body," and whether she 
believed that the true body was in the sacrament. It was a 
terrible question, but after a short pause she gave the following 
enigmatical answer ;— 

" Christ was the word that spake it ; 
He took the bread and brake it ; 
And what the word did make it. 
That I believe and take it." 

An answer which, however slight and superficial in appearance, 
contains much good sense and judgment, and enabled her to 
escape the snare which was laid for her, and into which a 
direct and positive reply would certainly have betrayed her. 



QUEEN ELIZABETH. 51 

It has been urged that as Elizabeth was a protestant, and did 
not believe the doctrine of the real presence, she ought at 
once to have said so ; to have let her yea be yea, and her 
nay nay, even though her nay should have sent her to the 
scaffold. But One there was in the old time who replied to 
the questionings of persecutors in the same fashion, when a 
direct reply must have brought an instant overthrow. It is , 
not always wise nor right to utter all your mind. You may 
have your whole hand full of truth, and yet only open your 
little finger. On this principle Elizabeth acted, and in doing 
so she was justified both by Scripture and reason. 

Gloomy days for England were those of the first Mary, 
Happily that reign was short. The life of the queen was 
wretched. "The consciousness of being hated by her subjects, 
the prospect of Elizabeth's succession, apprehensions of the 
danger to which the catholic religion stood exposed, dejection 
for the loss of Calais, concern for the ill state of her affairs, 
and, above all, anxiety for the absence of her husband, who 
she knew intended soon to depart for Spain, and to settle 
there for the remainder of his life ; all these melancholy 
reflections preyed upon her mind, and threw her into a lingering 
fever, of which she died." 

She died, and the privy council conveyed intelligence of her 
death to the House of Lords ; the chancellor addressed the 
members, and as he ended, the house resounded with the 
joyful acclamations, " God save Queen Elizabeth I long and 
happy may she reign !" The news spread, and every where 
was received with demonstrations of joy. Courtiers, gallant 
knights, and haughty nobles, set out for Hadfield, where the 
princess then resided, and soon that quiet place was the 
scene of the greatest splendour. Thither flocked the nobility, 
all eager to do homage to the maiden queen, and there 



53 QUEEN ELIZABETH. 

councils of state were held for several successive days. At 
length she entered London, and was greeted with the utmost 
enthusiasm. From walls and house-tops waved clouds of 
banners and ensigns, and ships in the river were dressed with 
flags, from stem to stern. Cannon roared, and bells rang 
out their joy-notes. After continuing some days at Lord 
North's, her majesty removed to the Tower. With what different 
sensations did she enter that strange old fortress : the cir- 
cumstances of her imprisonment, so short a period before, so 
wrought upon her feelings that she fell upon her knees, and 
poured forth her grateful acknowledgements to heaven for the 
almost miraculous change in her condition, which she com- 
pared to the deliverance of Daniel from the lions' den. Thus 
auspiciously began the reign of Queen Elizabeth. Thus 
broke the morning of those golden days. 

The queen remained in the Tower till the 5th of December, 
holding councils of state. She was present at her .sister's 
funeral, and listened attentively to the oration delivered by 
Dr. White. This oration is styled a black sermon, and was 
written in Latin ; being a biographical sketch of the late 
sovereign. Toward the conclusion he said the queen had left 
a sister, a lady of great worth, whom they were bound to obey, 
for that a living dog was better than a dead lion ! Elizabeth 
fired at this inelegant simile, and felt sorely displeased with 
the orator, who roundly asserted that the dead deserved more 
praise than the living, for " Mary had chosen the better part." 
Elizabeth ordered the bishop to be arrested, and the bishop 
threatened to excommunicate the queen ; " for which," one 
says, '* she cared not a rush." 

At first the queen conformed to the formula of the church of 
Rome, proceeding very cautiously in her attempt to re-establish 
protestant ascendancy. At last, finding the public mind pre- 



QUEEN ELIZABETH. 53 

pared for the change, she withdrew from mass, and began to 
assert her right to supremacy. As yet she was an uncrowned 
queen. That important ceremony of crowning must shortly take 
place, and who so fit as Dr. Dee, the pet conjurer and royal 
astrologer, to fix the day ! Robert Dudley was sent to 
concert with this man about the matter — for astrology then 
prevailed in England, and nearly every body believed in lucky 
and unlucky days — and it was agreed that no day would be so 
auspicious as the 15th of January. On the day preceding, 
in high state and glory, in a royal chariot, covered with 
crimson velvet, and attended by a most splendid retinue, 
Elizabeth passed through London, from the Tower to West- 
minster. Wonderfully gracious was the royal lady, and 
when the roar of a thousand voices broke out into " God save 
your grace," her grace replied, "God save you all." Next day 
the queen was crowned, the coronation oath was administered ; 
the champion, in complete armour, cast down his gauntlet, 
and offered to do battle for the queen's right — and Garter 
King-at-arras proclaimed that all allegiance was due to " the 
most high and mighty princess, our dread sovereign. Lady 
Elizabeth, by the grace of God, Queen of England, France, 
Ireland, defender of the true ancient and catholic faith, most 
worthy empress from the Orcade Isles to the mountains 
Pyrenee." 

The morning after her coronation she went to chapel, and 
it was then the custom on such occasions to release prisoners. 
One of the courtiers presented a petition, praying that five 
prisoners might be released — their names were Matthew, 
Mark, Luke, John, and Paul, and they were no others than 
the four evangelists, and great apostle, shut up in an unknown 
tongue. It was an important petition, and the queen 
answered, very gravely, that she must first enquire of them 

F 2 



54 QUEEN ELIZABETH. 

whether they approved of being released. It seems they did, 
or rather the church convocation did for them, for a trans- 
lation of the Scriptures was soon afterwards published. 

To reform the church, and to re-establish the doctrines the 
reformers taught, was a work of difficulty and danger. And 
we must not cast a slur on the caution of her who guided the 
affairs of the realm, and had to pilot her bark amid shoals 
and quick-sands. The vessel of the church was in troubled 
waters ; there were storms without, and want of unity within. 
It needed a skilful hand to escape the dangers that beset the 
roadstead to the peaceful haven ; there were lofty heights of 
proud defiance, and sunken rocks of secret enmity, and shoals 
of prejudice. We must not blame the queen for acting as she 
did. Her course seemed zig-zag, and so it was ; but there 
was actual progress on the whole. And with regard to her 
intolerance, for doubtless she was intolerant, it must be 
attributed to the effects of her education, to the former 
period of her life, and to the circumstances in which she now 
found herself. When, after years of labour, she found the 
reformed church established in her land, she adopted, or rather 
began to express the spirit of all true conservatism — the thing 
that is, is the thing that ought to be, and the thing that ought 
to be is the thing that must be maintained. And she 
maintained it, by sending non-content ministers to rusticate in 
gaol, suppressing all dissenters' meetings, and hanging, and 
even in one or two cases, burning for conscience sake. It was 
a huge wrong, and an unmistakeable error, but the error arose 
from want of knowledge ; she did not understand the true 
spirit of Christianity, and there were very many good and 
earnest people then in the same state. Calvin burnt Ser- 
vetus, and once upon a time, John the beloved, wanted to 
call down fire from heaven, to burn up the enemies of Christ. 



QUEEN ELIZABETH. 55 

When Queen Elizabeth said to the bishops, " As for me and 
my house, we will serve the Lord," she really meant what she 
said. 

Besides the religious agitations of the reign, the question of 
the queen's marriage attracted a great deal of interest. She 
had refused the proffered hand of her sister's widower, Philip II. 
of Spain. Bishop Jewel tells his Zurich correspondent that 
" Nothing is yet talked about the queen's marriage ; yet there 
are now courting her, the King of Sweden, the Saxon, (son 
of John Frederick, Duke of Saxony) and Charles, the son of 
the emperor, Ferdinand, to say nothing of the Englishman, 
Sir William Pickering." Jewel is the first who mentions 
Pickering among the aspirants for Elizabeth's hand. Henry 
Fitz-Alan, Earl of Arundel, also sought the queen's favour. She 
had lovers enough and to spare, but the most conspicuous was 
Robert Dudley, a married man ! The story of this love forms 
the groundwork of one of Sir Walter Scott's most pleasing 
fictions ; and the sad tale of Amy Robsart attaches melancholy 
interest to Kenilvvorth ; but, alas for the fiction, Amy Robsart 
was dead fifteen years before the pageant took place at the 
castle. 

Elizabeth encouraged the suit of her courtier Dudley, the 
Earl of Leicester ; he was continued in close attendance on her 
person. One of his political rivals gave him a blow at the 
council board, whereupon Queen Elizabeth informed the pug- 
nacious statesman that he must lose his hand, in obedi- 
ence to the law, which imposed that penalty for the commission 
of such an outrage ; but the matter was hushed up on Dudley's 
interceding for the nobleman, with his royal mistress. Reports, 
indeed, went abroad, scandalous to majesty, and like ill 
weeds, which, as the proverb tells us, grow apace, were multiplied 
with wondrous prodigality. But in the mind of Queen 



56 QUEEN ELIZABETH. 

Elizabeth there was but small attention pain to these matters ; 
they who uttered them did so at their peril, for lynx-eyed law 
was watching, and would eke be dov/n upon them, slitting the 
nostrils, or cropping the ears, as the good old law was wont to 
do — but as for the queen herself, she was untroubled about 
what report might say. With respect to marriage, she had 
solemnly bound herself in marriage to the realm, and had 
declared that it would be quite sufficient for the memorial of 
her name and for her glory, if, when she died, an inscription 
were engraved on marble, saying, " Here lieth Queen Elizabeth, 
who reigned and died a virgin." 

Again and again the Roman pontiff sought to bring her 
back to the fold of the catholic church ; but Elizabeth was 
unalterable in her determination, and despite loving letters, 
friendly greetings, bright promises, black threatenings, and 
the rest of it, remained true to the protestant church. She 
loved her people, and her policy, both in church and state, was 
of an elevated and enlightened character. 

The English currency was in a very bad condition ; to 
restore it to sterling value was one glorious measure of her 
reign. Edward YI., nor Mary, had dared to attempt it; 
Henry VIII. had caused copper to be mingled with the silver ; 
a great disgrace to the kingdom, a damage to his successors, 
and a cruel wrong to the people ; Elizabeth had all the old 
money called in, and every person received the nominal value 
of the base coin in new sterling money, the government 
standing at the loss. The reformation of the currency was 
even extended to unhappy Ireland ; a reformation it liked a 
thousand fold better than the reformation of its old faith. Sang 
the people ; — 



QUEEN ELIZABETH. 57 

" Let bonfires shine in every place, 
Sing and ring the bells, apace ; 
And pray that long may live her grace, 
To be the good Queen of Ireland. 

The gold and silver which was so base, 
That no man could endure it scarce. 
Is now new- coined with her own face, 
And made to go current in Ireland." 

Still went on all sorts of proposed matrimonial alliances. 
To marry Elizabeth of England was the high ambition of 
princes ; hut her majesty still continued to lead a life of 
celibacy, her determination had been expressed to Leicester in 
thememorable words," I will have here but one mistress, 
AND NO master." She was entreated in an earnest address 
from both houses of parliament, to enter into wedlock ; but 
nothing could induce her to step over the magic circle of a 
wedding ring ! She took on herself all the duties and 
responsibilities of government, at a moment of deep interest in 
the history of England. One great cause of trouble was the 
Queen of Scots, whose story we have yet to tell : the domestic 
administration of Elizabeth was further disturbed by the 
agitation and the faction of religious parties. Fear was 
awakened in the court from catholic confederations. A re- 
bellion broke out, and threatened the stability of the throne : — 

" It was the time when England's queen. 
Twelve years had reign'd a sovereign dread, 
Nor yet the restless crown had been 
Disturbed upon her virgin head ; 
But now the inly working north, 
Was ripe to send its thousands forth, 
A potent vassalage to fight, 
In Percy's and in Neville's right: 
Two earls fast leagued in discontent, 
Who gave their wishes open vent, 



58 QUEEN ELIZABETH. 

And boldly urged a general plea, 
The rites of ancient piety, 
To be triumphantly restored, 
By the dread justice of the sword." 

The rebels entered Durham in warlike array, and burnt as 
many bibles as they could find, but the queen's troops sup- 
pressed the insurrection, and the leaders gave up their lives at 
the block and the gibbet. The pope excommunicated the 
queen, and catholics styled her the Pretender, Attempts were 
made upon her life, but God saved the queen. 

The royal progresses of Queen Elizabeth are a very romance 
in themselves. From mansion to mansion went her majesty, 
every where greeted with loyal enthusiasm, and received with 
the warmest welcome. Elizabeth, at Kenilworth, is a type of 
the whole ; and some few facts regarding her stay at that 
princely residence, may not be out of place. The queen was 
welcomed at Ichington, a town about seven miles from KeniW 
worth, and dined under an immense tent, and " as a diversion 
at the desert, was shewn two of the rarities of the country,-— 
a fat boy, of six years old, nearly five feet high, but very 
stupid ; and, to match this prodigy, a monstrous sheep of 
the Leicestershire breed." In the afternoon, the queen fol- 
lowed the chase, and hunted towards Kenilworth, where she 
arrived at about eight in the evening, and was welcomed by a 
continual series of pageants to the gate of the castle, and 
thence duly received by the porter, representing Hercules, 
" tall of person, big of limb, and stern of countenance, wrapt 
in a pall of silk, with a club and keys ; he had a rough 
speech full of passions in metre :" — 

'* What stir, what wit is here ? come back, hold ! whither now ? 
Not one so stout to stir — what harrying have we here ? 
My friends, a porter I, no puppet here am placed. 



QUEEN ELIZABETH, 59 

By leave, perhaps, else not, while club and limbs do last 

A garboil this indeed ! what, yea, fair dames, what yea ! 

What dainty darling 's here ? 'Fore heaven, a precious pearl !" 

The queen and her train passed through the gate, accom- 
panied by the poetical porter, and arrived on the bridge over 
the moat. There a lady, with two nymphs, came to her all 
across the pool, as if she walked in the water, and again burst 
out into a metrical welcome. The grand pageant, however, 
was a temporary bridge, over the base court, all decked with 
mythological emblems. On her arrival all the clocks in the 
castle were stopped, that none might take note of time while 
the queen lingered; and as she entered her chamber "peals of 
great guns were shot off," which continued, with a profusion of 
fireworks, for two hours : and the noise and flame were heard 
and seen for twenty miles around. On Sunday the queen 
went to church, and in the afternoon of the day, had music 
and dancing with *' lively agility ;" and at night, fireworks, 
which made old Laneham " vengeably afraid." Monday 
came more pageants, more wild men grown poetical, more 
gods and goddesses, in cerulean garments, more Ladies of the 
Lake, and Sylvanus all wreathed and girdled with oak leaves. 
Then on the Wednesday came a hunt, more pageants, fireworks, 
and feasting, and more than all a tumbler from Italy, who 
turned and twisted in a manner marvellous to behold. On the 
next Sunday the queen was again at church, and heard a 
*'fruitful sermon," and in the afternoon had a comely quintain 
set up in the tilt yard, and much pleasant sport thereat. 
Among other entertainments was Arion, on a dolphin of vast 
dimensions, who came swimming across the lake to do her 
homage ; but Arion, alas, had tasted too freely of Lord 
Leicester's wine, and when he came opposite the queen, 
pulled off his mask and swore that he was none of Arion, not 



60 QUEEN ELIZABETH. 

he ; but honest Henry Goldingham. A proceeding which, it 
is said, pleased the queen more than all the rest of the per- 
formance. 

Pageants, such as those we have described, were every 
where prepared to greet her majesty. In Latin hexameters, 
or in plain Saxon rhymes, strangely-decked deities of a bygone 
heathenism, addressed the queen. There was a curious 
admixture of Christianity and the mythology of ancient Greece 
and Bome. " Sylvanus " tendered the produce of the forest, 
and "Truth" presented an English Bible. We have not 
space, neither have we the inclination, to record the gay doings 
of royalty. Sterner business called away her thoughts from 
frivolities, and Elizabeth knew well how to be the unbending 
monarch when danger was nigh. 

Carpenters and shipbuilders were hard at work in the dock- 
yards of Spain. A dark cloud was gathering over England. 
Danger threatened. He who had been refused as a husband 
was about to land as an invader, and dethrone her whose throne 
he sought to share. The Invincible Armada was approaching 
in one " fell swoop." The land forces of England exceeded 
the enemy in point of number, but greatly inferior in discipline, 
reputation, and experience. An army of twenty thousand 
men was posted in different parts of the southern coast, under 
a strict injunction, that if they could not prevent the landing 
of the Spaniards, they should retire backwards, ravage the 
country around, and wait for a reinforcement from the neigh- 
bouring counties, before they ventured to approach the enemy. 
A body of twenty-two thousand infantry, and one thousand 
cavalry, under the command of the Earl of Leicester, was 
encamped at Tilbury, in order to protect the capital. In order 
to arouse the martial spirit of the nation, the queen appeared 
on horseback in the camp, and, riding through the lines of 



QUEEN ELIZABETH. 61 

armed men, exhorted the soldiers to the performance of their 
duty. Her heroic spirit communicated itself to the army, and 
every man felt himself a host by the words she uttered. It is 
said that Napoleon had words in him like Austerlitz battles : 
Elizabeth's oratory was of the same description. She aroused 
the war spirit, and she sought to arouse it ; but it was not 
aggressive warfare ; it was that battling for our native land, 
which is of a totally opposite character — a battle for home 
and happiness, for the churches where our fathers worshipped, 
and the grave-yards where our loved ones sleep. Thus spoke 
Queen Elizabeth : — 

" My loving people : we have been persuaded by some, 
that are careful of our safety, to take heed how we commit 
ourselves to armed multitudes, for fear of treachery ; but I 
assure you I do not desire to live to distrust my faithful and 
loving people. Let tyrants fear ; I have always so behaved 
myself that, under God, I have placed my chiefest strength 
and safeguard in the loyal hearts and good will of my subjects, 
and therefore I am come amongst you, as you see at this time, 
not for my recreation and disport, but being resolved, in the 
midst and heat of the battle, to live or die amongst you all ; 
to lay down for ray God, and for my kingdom, and for my 
people, my honour and my blood even in the dust. I know 
that I have the body but of a weak and feeble woman, but I 
have the heart and stomach of a king, aye, and of a king of 
England, too : and think foul scorn that Parma, or Spain,? or 
any prince of Europe, should dare to invade the borders of my 
realm : to which, rather than any dishonour shall grow by me, 
I myself will take up arms : I myself will be your general, 
judge, and rewarder of every one of your virtues in the field. 
I know already, for your forwardness, you have deserved 
rewards and crowns, and we assure you, on the word of a 

G 



62 QUEEN ELIZABETH. 

prince, they shall be duly paid you. In the meantime ray 
lieutenant-general shall be in my stead, than whom never 
prince commanded a more noble or worthy subject, not 
doubting, but by your obedience to my general, by your con- 
cord in the camp, and your valour in the field, we shall shortly 
have a famous victory over those enemies of my God, of my 
kingdoms, and of my people." 

The end of the aggression upon England is well known. 
It failed. The stars in their courses fought against Sisera. 
Every thing conspired to the destruction of the vast armament, 
and the purposes of the Armada was entirely frustrated. 
Not one half of the fleet returned to Spain, and a still smaller 
portion of the soldiers and seamen. Yet Philip, whose com- 
mand of temper was equal to his ambition, received with 
. an air of tranquillity the news of so humiliating a disaster. 
" I sent my fleet," said he, " to combat the English, not the 
elements. God be praised that the calamity is not greater." 

Another attempt of the Spanish king to invade England 
failed, and the loss to Spain was estimated at twenty millions 
of ducats. Never was a nation so despised as Spain, by the 
English, in the days of Queen Bess. Elizabeth was at the 
height of her fame : — 

" Girt with many a baron bold, 
Sublime their starry fronts they rear : 
And gorgeous dames, and fltatesmen old, 
In bearded maj esty appear. 
In the midst a form doth shine, 
Her eye proclaims her of the British line ; 
Her Hon port, her awe-commanding face, 
Attempered sweet to virgin grace." 

Raleigh, Drake, Burleigh, Shakespeare, Bacon, Leicester^ 
Walsingham, what great and mighty names are these ! and 
these are they that formed the court of good Queen Bess,. 



QUEEN ELIZABETH. CS 

The latter years of her life were troubled. Her favourites 
deceived and betrayed her. Essex, on whom she relied, fell 
under her displeasure, and died for his offence, but the blow 
was a severe one to Elizabeth. She had grown old and 
weary. She walked much in her privy chamber, stamping 
with her foot at ill-news, and thrusting a rusty sword into the 
arras in great rage. She spent much of her time in sighing 
and groaning, and sitting alone, with her heart sad and heavy. 
Those she once loved were gone ; she had now none to trust 
in. She felt alone in all her regal splendour. " I am not 
sick," she said, " I feel no pain, yet I pine away." She died 
on the 24th of March, 1603, having lived nearly to the age of 
seventy; and with her ended the dynasty of the House of 
Tudor. 

The wise ministers and brave warriors who flourished under 
her reign, share the praise of her success ; but instead of 
lessening the applause due to her, they made great addition 
to it. They owed, all of them, their advancement to her 
choice : they were supported by her constancy, and with all 
their abilities they were never able to acquire any undue ascen- 
dancy over her. In her family, in her court, in her kingdom, 
she remained equally mistress. The force of the tender 
passions was great over her, but the force of her mind was 
still superior ; and the combat which her victory visibly cost 
her, serves only to display the firmness of her resolution, and 
the loftiness of her ambitious sentiments.* 

The fame of this princess, though it has surmounted the 
prejudices both of faction and bigotry, yet lies still exposed to 
another prejudice, which is more durable, because more 
natural, and which, according to the different views in which 
we survey her, is capable either of exalting beyond measure, or 
* Hume. 



64 QUEEN ELIZABETH. 

diminishing the lustre of her character. This prejudice is 
founded on the consideration of her sex. When we contem- 
plate her as a woman, we are apt to be struck with the highest 
admiration of her great qualities and extensive capacity ; but 
we are also apt to require some more softness of disposition, 
some greater lenity of temper, some of those amiable weak- 
nesses by which her sex is distinguished. But the true 
method of estimating her merit, is to lay aside all these con- 
siderations, and consider her merely as a rational being, 
placed in authority, and intrusted with the government of 
mankind. "We may find it difficult to reconcile our fancy to 
her as a wife or a mistress ; but her qualities as a sovereign, 
though with some considerable exceptions, are the object of 
undisputed applause and approbation. 



JOANNA BAILLIE. 



Joanna Baillie was tlie daughter of a Scottish clergyman, 
and numbered many men eminent for position and attainments 
amongst her family connections. The birthplace of the poetess 
was the Manse of Bothwell, near the river Clyde. She was 
early distinguished for peculiar ability, and succeeded while 
still a girl, in securing for her writings, at that time published 
anonymously, a high place among the great names which theii 
presided in the world of letters. In 1798 she published an 
important addition to the written drama, under the title of 
"A Series of Plays ; in which it is attempted to delineate the 
stronger passions of the mind, each being the subject of a 
tragedy and a comedy." This book at once marked its 
authoress as one of superior intelligence. But it was evident 
that the writer was not practically acquainted with the stage. 
Her plays were more adapted for perusal in the family or the 
study, than representing in the theatre. In character and 
construction they were essentially poems, poems of a very high 
order, and as such enjoy a reputation for grace, beauty, and 
true poetic inspiration, which no lapse of time can effect. 

Only one of her dramas has been performed on the London 
stage. Kemble brought out " De Montfort," and it was acted 
eleven nights. Of this play it has been said that too much 
importance is attached to the development of single passions 
in single tragedies. For the stage more stirring incidents are 
required to justify the passions of her characters, and to give 
them that air of fatality, which though peculiarly predominant 

G 2 



66 JOANNA BATLLIE. 

in the Greek drama, is found, to a certain extent, in all suc- 
cessful tragedies. Instead of this, she contrived to make all 
the passions of her main characters proceed from the wilful 
nature of the beings themselves. Their feelings were not pre- 
cipitated by circumstances, like a stream down a declivity, 
that leaps from rock to rock ; but for want of incident they 
seem often like water on a level without a propelling impulse. 
But though all this may be critically true, there is an inde- 
scribable charm over the whole which bids defiance to the 
critic's power. In the description of Jane de Montfort, which 
by the way, has been pronounced to be a perfect picture of 
Mrs. Siddons, the tragic actress, there is great for«e and 
power : — 

Page. —Madam, there is a lady ia your hall 
Who begs to be admitted to your presence. 
Lady. — Is it one of our invited friends ? 
Page. — No, far unlike to them, it is a stranger. 
Lady. — How looks her countenance ? 
Page. — So queenl)'^, so commanding, and so noble, 
I shrunk at first in awe ; but when she smiled, 
Methought I would have compassed sea and land 
To do her bidding. 

Lady. — Is she old or young ? 
Page. — Neither, if right I guess, but she is fair. 
For time hath laid his hand so gently on her, 
As he, too, had been awed. 

Lady. — The foolish stripling! 
She has bewitched thee ; is she large in stature 1 
Page. — So stately and so graceful in her form, 
I thought at first her nature was gigantic ; 
But on a near approach I found in truth, 
She scarcely does surpass the middle size. 
Lady. — What is her garb ? 
Page. — I cannot well describe the fashion of it: 
She is nrt decked in any gallant trim, 
But seems to me clad in her usual weeds 



JOANNA BAILLIE. 



67 



Of high habitual state ; for as she moves 
"Wide flows her robe in many a waving fold, 
As I have seen unfurled banners play 
"With the soft breeze. 

Lady. — Thine eyes deceive thee, boy ; 
It is an apparition thou hast seen. 
Freherg. — {^Starting from his seat, where he has been sitting, 
during the conversation between the Lady and the Page.) 
It is an apparition he has seen, 
Or, it is Jane de Montfort. 

To Joanna Baillie's series of plays, a long and interesting 
introductory discourse was prefixed. In these prefatory re- 
marks, the authoress discussed the subject of the drama in all 
its bearings, and asserted the supremacy of simple nature over 
all decoration and refinement. "Let one simple trait of the 
human heart, one expression of passion, genuine and true to 
nature, be introduced, and it will stand forth alone in the 
boldness of reality, while the false and unnatural around it 
fades away upon every side, like the rising exhalations of the 
morning." The style of her poems is simple and masculine, 
free from all the insipid sentimentalisra of which the world 
has had too much ; and equally free from that florid decora- 
tive style which so often obscures the thought in a multiplicity 
of illustration, which cultivates the foliage at the expense 
of the fruit. 

In 1810 was published the ^'Family Legend,;'' a tragedy 
founded on a highland tradition, which met with the high ap- 
proval of Sir Walter Scott, and was brought out with some 
success at the Edinburgh theatre. But like her other works, 
it was unnecessarily and unwisely restrained. Her notion of 
unity made her sacrifice effect, and every other theatrical 
attraction, to it ; thus circumscribing the business of the piece, 
and excluding the interest arising from varied and conflicting 



68 JOANNA BAILLIE. 

emotions. They seem to breathe .of the study more than the 
noise and business of life, when hope and fear, and pride and 
humility, and revenge, and pity, and love, and hatred, are con- 
tending for the mastery. 

Touchingly beautiful is the speech of Prince Edward in his 
dungeon : — 



Doth the bright sun from the bigh arch of heaven, 

In all his beauteous robes of fleckered clouds, 

And ruddy vapours and deep glowing flames, 

And softly varied shades, look gloriously ? 

Do the green woods dance to the wind? the lakes 

Cast up their sparkling waters to the light ? 

Do the sweet hamlets in their bushy dells 

Send winding up to heaven their curling smoke 

On the soft morning air ? 

Do the flocks bleat, and the wild creatures bound 

In antic happiness ? and mazy birds 

Wing the mid air in lightly skimming bands'? 

Aye, all this is-^men do behold all this — 

The poorest man. Even in this lonely vault, 

My dark and narrow world, oft do I bear 

The crowing of the cock so near my walls, 

And sadly think, how small a space divides me 

From all this fair creation." 



In 1836 Joanna Baillie published three more volumes of 
plays ; her career as a dramatic writer thus extending over 
thirty-eight years. Of her other writings, the principal is 
the " Birthday," addressed to a maiden sister, who was her 
companion during the greater part of her life. This poem is 
enriched with beautiful pictures of the child-life of the writer, 
and abounds in records of the associations and affections of 
home :' — 



JOANNA BAILLIE. 69 

'* Even now methinks 
Each little cottage of my native vale 
Swells out its earthen sides, upheaves its roof, 
Like to a hillock moved hy labouring mole, 
And with green trail-weeds clambering up its walls, 
Roses and every gay and fragrant plant, 
Before my fancy stands, a fairy bower. 
Aye, and within it, too, do fairies dwell. 
Peep through its wreathed window, if indeed 
The flowers grow not too close ; and there within 
Thou'lt see some half a dozen rosy brats, 
Eating from wooden bowls their dainty milk — 
These are my mountain elves." 

The character indeed of this gifted lady received its truest 
development in the simple and unostentatious incidents of 
domestic life. Though she wrote of human passions, she loved 
not to mingle with the great world ; the noise and bustle of 
the world astir. She loved to hear from afar, not to join in 
the busiest scenes of its display. She was one of the last 
surviving literary contemporaries of the age in which Johnson, 
and Goldsmith, and Burke, and Reynolds flourished. But 
though she enjoyed an extensive popularity, and an acquaint- 
ance with the most illustrious people of the day, she could 
never be lured from her loved seclusion. Her ear never 
thirsted to drink in the plaudits of society ; and she knew not 
the little ambition of being gazed at and lionized. Observing 
the unobtrusive duties and charities of private life ; loved by 
the few who personally knew her, and admired and respected 
by the thousands without, who knew her as the gifted writer, 
the talented authoress, she lived to reach the patriarchal age 
of eighty-nine. She died on Sunday evening, the 23rd of 
February, 1851. 



LADY JANE GREY. 



"Pride goeth before destruction, and a haughty spirit 
before a fall." In ancient Kome they sometimes cast crimi- 
nals from a lofty rock, and the fall was certain death. That 
craggy cliff was but a fitting symbol of a haughty spirit ; its 
highest elevation was the turning point of destruction. His- 
tory abounds with instances of this truth. Wolsey arose from 
a humble position to a place of high dignity ; his proud spirit 
grew prouder as he advanced ; but the last step was fatal. 

" This is the state of man ; to-day he puts forth 
The tender leaves of hope ; to-morrow blossoms, 
And bears his blushing honours thick upon him ; 
The third day comes a frost, a killing frost ; 
And when he thinks, good easy man, full surely 
His greatness is a ripening, nips his root, 
And then he falls." 

No man liveth to himself. Every man is the centre of a cir- 
cle. The influence which one man exerts over the destinies 
of others is incalculable. None know where it ends. The 
proud man, bearing his full honours, draws upward with him 
others, and when he falls, they fall. The destruction of one 
very often involves the ruin of others. The innocent suffer 
with the guilty. Of this we have not a more powerful illus- 
tration, or a more melancholy instance, than the story of Lady 
Jane Grey. 



LADY JANE GREY. 71 

Lady Jane Grey was the daughter of Henry Grey, Marquis 
of Dorset, by Lady Frances Brandon, daughter of the Dulce 
of Suffolk, and was royally descended on both sides. She was 
born in 1537, at Bradgate, her father's seat in Leicestershire. 
She worked admirably with her needle, wrote an incomparable 
hand, played well on different instruments, and acquired a 
knowledge of the Greek and Latin, as well as of the French 
and Italian languages. She was not more distinguished by 
the beauty of her person, than the endowments of her mind. 
She was strongly attatched to the protestant religion. Roger 
Ascham, preceptor to the Princess Elizabeth, having once paid 
her a visit, found her engaged in reading the Phaedo of Plato, 
while the rest of the family were hunting in the park ; and 
on his expressing his surprise at the singularity of her choice, 
she assured him that she received more pleasure from the 
works of that author, than the others could derive from all 
their splendid sports and pastimes. 

A quiet happy life was that of the Lady Jane. Surrounded 
by some of the most beautiful scenery in England, enjoying 
the society of those she loved, untroubled by care, unrestrained 
by anxiety, her early days passed away like a gentle dream. 
Her passions were lulled, and her mind awakened. She loved 
to question past ages, and to unravel their dark wisdom. The 
book which Ascham found her reading was a fair sample of 
her character. The Phaedo is an accurate account of the last 
hours of Socrates, and contains the opinions of the wisest of 
the ancients respecting the immortality of the soul. To her 
the study of the unseen, the world beyond the grave, was a 
delightful pursuit. Then it was that she seemed to spring up 
on the wings of a pangless and seraphic life. Thus she would 
linger for hours over the pages of that strange old book, and 
talked admiringly of the undaunted gaze of Socrates, as he 



72 LADY JANE GREY. 

took the fatal draught ; and how, when he felt his limbs grow 
heavy, he laid himself down to die. In these melancholy 
musings, there seemed a premonition of her coming doom ; 
something that indicated that the gentle woman had learned 
already with how many garlands we can hang the tomb. 

In 1551, her father was created Duke of Suffolk; but 
ducal coronets do not insure happiness. Jane was called 
away from her beloved pursuits to the atmosphere of a royal 
court, and the society of those who had but little sympathy for 
the thoughtful, loving woman. How often, when surrounded 
by gay groups of flattering courtiers, did she long for the re- 
tirement of her old home I how often, when engaged in the 
royal pageants, did she sigh for the quietude of Bradgate ! 
Placentia might charm Leland to exclaim : — 

" How bright the lofty seat appears, 
Like Jove's great palace crowned with stars, 
What roofs, what windows charm the eye, 
What turrets, rivals of the sky ! " — 

But to Jane they were stale, flat, and unprofitable. 

At court the Duke of Northumberland noticed Lady Jane. 
Northumberland was ambitious and crafty. He projected a 
marriage between the scholarly daughter of Suffolk, and his 
own son. Lord Guildford Dudley. It was a period of great 
changes. A disputed succession is the very time for the am- 
bitious. Edward VI., the boy king, was not long for this 
world, and the Ladies Elizabeth and Mary, his sisters, were 
placed in most perplexing circumstances. Northumberland 
ruled the land with despotic power. The parliament was com- 
posed of his partizans, all submissive to his will. As appre- 
hensions were entertained of Edward's health and life, it be- 
came necessary to provide for the succession. On the principle 



LADY JANE GREY. 73 

of hereditary right, the crown would descend first to the imme- 
diate issue of Henry ; then to the children of Margaret Tudor, 
queen of the Scots ; and then to Mary Tudor, queen of France. 
Mary and Elizabeth were by act of parliament declared ille- 
gitimate. He had also passed by the descendants of Mar- 
garet, his eldest sister, and fixed on the issue of Mary, queen 
of France. This lady by her second marriage with the Duke 
of Suffolk, had two daughters ; one of them was wedded to 
Henry Grey, Marquis of Dorset, created Duke of Suffolk. 
The hand of Lady Jane, their eldest daughter, had been ob- 
tained for Lord Guilford Dudley, and the right of succession 
claimed by the House of Suffolk, devolved on this excellent 
woman. 

The Duke of Northumberland had prepared his plans. 
Were his daughter-in-law queen, he would surely be the high- 
est man in the realm, and rule with power despotic. Who 
but he could influence so ably the mind of the young King 
Edward ? At the palace of Greenwich he was ever in attend- 
ance on that monarch ; to all others, he was the proud lord, 
but to the king, the humble and submissive subject. He in- 
sinuated, in his own careful way, how both Mary and Elizabeth 
were incapacitated from ascending the throne ; how, if Mary 
reigned, protestantism would soon be on the wane, and the re- 
formed church entirely overthrown ; but how the Lady Jane 
was in every way deserving of a throne, and in every way 
fitted for that high dignity. Even if her title by blood were 
doubtful, which there was no reason to suppose, the king was 
invested with the same power which his father enjoyed, and 
might leave her the crown by letters patent. A fatal legacy ! 

The arguments of Northumberland had their full weight 
with the young king. He knew the Lady Jane, admired her 
excellence, respected her talents, and, more than all, knew her 

H 



74 LADY JANE GREY. 

to love the cause he loved, and to be as firm a protestant as 
he. His feeble hand must soon resign the sceptre of autho- 
rity ; why should not that sceptre be held by the Lady Jane ; 
the crown which rested on his throbbing temples, must soon 
be worn by another — could the diadem rest on a fairer brow 
than on that of the Lady Jane ? Alas, that gentle woman knew 
not what was going on. She was the unconscious victim of the 
plot, she had but to act her part in that grand pageant which was 
to end in a direful tragedy. The dying boy, who was com- 
pletely under the tutelage of Northumberland, at length acqui- 
esced in the force of his arguments, and assuming to himself 
the powers which had been exercised by his father Henry, he 
determined upon having a new entail of the crown executed 
to the effect the duke had proposed. This document he 
sketched with his own hand, and a fair copy having been 
made, signed it with his own name, above, and below, and 
on each margin. The privy council was then assembled at 
Placentia, at least so many of them as Northumberland felt 
disposed to admit ; for he had a strong guard without who 
did his bidding, and whose law was the legality of the strong 
hand — a jurisprudence there is no disputing. Assembled in 
the council-chamber, the young king stated to the peers, what 
he had done, and his purpose in so doing. The councillors 
objected ; pleaded the act of parliament legitimatising the prin- 
cesses, and stated that such a law could not be abrogated ; so 
they separated in some confusion, and when they again met, 
declared that for them to unite in dispossessing Mary of the 
crown, and placing that crown on the head of the Lady Jane, 
they would subject themselves to the penalties of treason. 
Northumberland became furious with rage, called the Lord 
Montague a traitor, and threatened him and the rest ; so that, 
as an old author says, " they thought he would have beaten 



LADY JANE GREY. 75 

them." He said he was ready to fight any man in so just a 
quarrel. So the council was angrily dismissed, and presently, 
after much " brow-beating and bullying," suffered themselves 
to become parties in the transaction, and agreed to the change 
in the order of succession. 

So the document was duly signed and sealed, and the crown 
was bestowed on the Lady Jane. Poor blighted woman ; her 
fond dream of domestic happiness was soon to end ; for her 
no peace and happiness was in store ; the hapless one was 
being forced up yonder towering height to be cast headlong 
down ! The young king was rapidly sinking ; and after the 
deed was signed lingered but a few days, and then died : — 

" Child in age, and child in heart, 

Thy magnificent array, 
Could not joy or peace impart, — 

Thou had' St treasure more than they. 

More than courtiers kneeling low. 

More than flattery's ready smile, 
More than conquest o'er the foe. 

More, e'en more, than England isle. 

Treasures in which mind hath part, 

Joys that teach the soul to rise, 
Hopes that can sustain the heart, 

When the body droops and dies." 

The life of the king had troubled Northumberland, but his 
death troubled him still more. It seems to have taken iiim 
by surprise. His plans were not completed. Alas I for him, 
his talent and decision were not equal to his ambition. In 
order to gain a little time, he determined to conceal the king's 
death. He did so, and despatched letters to the Princess 
Mary, summoning her to the death-bed of her brother. Could 



76 LADY JANE GREY. 

he but bring the heir to London, the very stronghold of her 
enemies, then all were well. The towers of Julius had been 
the scene of many a strange sight ; and once within those 
walls, who could know aught of the Lady Mary ? Ambition 
can do all things. It can put on all shapes, and wear all cos- 
tumes, this or that side out. Ambition has sometimes been the 
twin brother of murder. The royal diadem has sometimes been 
stained with that same precious flood that dashed the naked 
feet of Cain. A crown in prospect, a visionary crown, but 
true as the dagger, and more eagerly to be clutched, brought 
about the dark destiny of Macbeth. It might be a somewhat 
similar purpose that induced Northumberland to seek the 
capture of the princess ; but, whatever might induce him so to 
act, he failed. Word was sent to Mary that her brother was 
dead ; and that Northumberland, who was plotting to place 
the Lady Jane on the throne, only wanted to make her a pri- 
soner. Elizabeth was also warned of the real state of affairs, 
and remained in Hertfordshire. 

Two days elapsed, and the death of the king was still kept 
secret. Northumberland consulted with his friends and de- 
pendents as to the best method of managing this great affair. 
Terrible risks were involved : it was the scaffold or the crown. 
The lord mayor of London, six aldermen, and twelve other 
citizens, who were only half of them merchants of the staple, 
and the other half merchant-adventurers, were summoned to 
Greenwich, where the dead body of the king was lying ; and 
where Northumberland, and some of the council, declared to 
them, under an oath of secresy, the death of the king ; as also 
how, by his last will and royal letters patent, he had appointed 
and ordained, that the Lady Jane should be his successor in 
the throne and sovereignty. Then the deputation were sworn 
to do allegiance to Lady Jane, and were bound, under a greai 



LADY JANE GREY. "7 

penalty, not to divulge these secret passages until they should 
receive orders from the council. 

Higher and higher up the hill of difficulty went Northum- 
berland and his party ; surely, from the summit, he antici- 
pated a view of all the kingdoms of the earth in a moment, 
and surely he expected that they would be his. It seemed 
as if no hazard was too great, no cost too large ; but the 
aspiring blood of Dudley would have to sink in the ground. 
News reached him that Mary was aware of her brother's death, 
and was preparing for a struggle. Time was short, the neces- 
sity was urgent. The instrument of his ambition, the hapless 
one with whom he played, must be brought forth ; so with 
his few faithful attendants, faithful as long as it were wise to 
be faithful, but wise enough to be faithless, when faithfulness 
brought danger, he set out for Sion House, where the Lady 
Jane resided. 

She was not seventeen years old, and her husband, Lord 
Dudley, was as young as herself. They were happy, very 
happy, for they loved each other fondly, and delighted in 
one another's society. Little thought they of the proud am- 
bition of Northumberland, and little of the danger which his 
ambition brought. They walked on a sun-lit beach, but forgot 
that the tide was advancing. When Northumberland stated 
his errand, Jane was overcome with terror and surprise, — she 
trembled and grew pale. As the duke proceeded, and stated 
the reasons for the rejection of Mary from the throne, Jane 
interrupted him : — 

" But Elizabeth is a good Protestant, my lord !" 

Nothing could turn Northumberland from his purpose. In 
his entreaties that Jane should accept the crown, he was aided 
by her father and brother, both of whom urged upon her, for 
her own sake and for theirs, no less than for that of the pro- 

H 2 



78 LADY JANE GREY. 

testant faith and the liberties of England, to ascend the throne. 
Jane, at last, consented ; but it was with tears, and with a 
heavy heart, that she stepped into the royal barge and was 
conveyed to the Tower. Within the Tower, she became little 
better than the prisoner of Northumberland, who straightway 
set about completing his schemes, and taking the last step, 
and reaching the highest elevation of his dangerous rock. 

The death of Edward was then made known, and Queen 
Jane was proclaimed in the city with somewhat less than the 
usual formalities. As the proclamation was made, and crowds 
of citizens and 'prentices collected in the Chepe, no voice 
was raised in honour of the new-made monarch, — none cried, 
'' God save her," not a shout was heard ; but, in a gloomy 
silence, men listened to the news. At Ludgate, indeed, that 
silence was broken, and the crowd heard the rough jests of a 
vintner's drawer, who was pleased to make merry at the new 
queen's cost ; and who, for his jibes, was handsomely re- 
warded by being set in the pillory, and having both his ears 
cropped off. This first public act of authority, on the part of 
Northumberland, gave promise but of tyrannous usage under 
the new regime. 

- In the provinces, many of the chief nobility were declaring 
in favour of Mary. Forces raised to serve Queen Jane went 
over to the rightful monarch : a small fleet which was sent down 
to the coast to intercept her, in case she should attempt to quit 
England, declared against the usurpation, and hoisted her- flag. 
Mary was proclaimed in Norwich, and wrote to the members 
of the privy council, demanding the throne which belonged to 
her by right. As Northumberland looked out from his high 
elevation, it was no beautiful landscape that stretched before 
him, but a grim and rocky defile, a threatening prospect that 
made him tremble as he gazed. The Lady Jane would, at 



LADY JANE GREY. 79 

once, have resigned, had she been permitted to do so, but this 
was not allowed. It were impossible to descend v/ith safety, 
—they must stand on the cliff, and bide their time. 

In reply to the missive of the queen, the council replied 
that her claims were opposed by the invalidity of her mother's 
marriage, by custom, by the last will of King Edward, and 
by the general voice of the people ! News of fresh accessions 
to the party of Mary arrived each day, and each day the 
prospect became more alarming. It was an easy matter to 
put the vintner's drawer in the pillory and crop his ears, but one 
could not serve all England so. Northumberland was in a 
dilemma ; an army must be sent against Mary. None could 
lead that army but himself, and if he quitted the council for 
the camp, the council would out-plot him. He wanted to place 
the Duke of SuflPolk, Lady Jane's father, at the head of the 
forces, which were to fall upon Mary before she could gain 
more strength, and bring her as a captive to the Tov/er. But 
Lady Jane pleaded so earnestly and took the matter so heavily, 
and with sighs and tears requested that her dear father might 
tarry at home in her company, that the council persuaded 
Northumberland himself to head the troops, saying, that no 
man was so fit as he, — had he not once achieved a victory in 
Norfolk ? And was he not so feared that none dare lift up 
arms against him ? Besides, they argued, he was the best 
man of war- in the realm, as well for ordering of his camp and 
soldiers, both in battle and in their tents ; as also, by experience, 
knowledge and wisdom, he could animate his army with witty 
persuasions, and also pacify and allay his enemies' pride with 
his stout courage, or else dissuade them if need were, from 
their enterprize, " Finally," said they, " this is the short 
and long, the queen will in no wise grant that her father shall 
take the command upon him."* 

* Stow. 



80 LADY JAITE GREY, 

So the Duke prepared to depart, but ere lie left he sum- 
moned the council and told them that he and the noble per- 
sonages that were about to go with him, were freely going to 
adventure their lives and bodies in the good cause, and 
reminded them that they left their children and families at 
home committed to their truth and fidelity. He called upon 
them to remember their recent oaths of allegiance to the 
queen's highness, the virtuous Lady Jane, *' who," said he, 
" by your and our enticement is rather of force placed on the 
throne than by her own seeking and request." 

If Noa^thumberland never uttered another word of truth, 
this at least was a verity. Jane had not sought the crown. 
She had not achieved greatness. She had not been born 
great ; she had had the greatness thrust upon her. The 
Duke called upon the council to remember this, and to 
stand by the young queen. All promised, but nearly all had 
made up their minds to declare for Queen Mary. So the 
proud man in his steel harness marched through the city 
streets with his army of six thousand men. Throngs gathered 
about him, multitudes rushed forth to see him pass, but no 
man wished him " God speed." On the following Sunday, 
Ridley preached at Paul's Cross, and stoutly maintained the 
right and title of the Lady Jane, inveighing earnestly against 
both Mary and Elizabeth. The crowd listened in silence ; 
they had no faith in his argument. On that very afternoon 
the Lord Treasurer stole out of the Tower, and began to make 
preparations for the council going over in a body to Mary, 
He returned in the night, and others joined in the plot. They 
persuaded Suffolk that in order to levy fresh forces, it would 
be necessary to hold their meetings at Baynard Castle and no 
longer v/ithin the Tower walls ; and he, imbecile that he was, 
consented. When the council met at Baynard Castle, they at 



LADY JANE GREY. 81 

once declared for Queen Mary. Members of their body were 
dismissed to tender their submission, and express their 
exceeding great loyalty. Then the Lord Mayor and the 
council, and the Herald at Arms rode into Chepe, and sound- 
ing trumpets, proclaimed the Lady Mary, daughter to Henry 
VIIL and Queen Catherine, to be Queen of England, France, 
and Ireland, Defender of the Faith, and supreme head of the 
Church ! and then, to add to the solemnity of the scene, they 
went in procession to St. Paul's, singing Te Deum. The 
rejoicings were very great, and the sounds of those rejoicings 
fell heavily on the ears of Queen Jane's party ; and the unfortu- 
nate lady, after wearing the crown twelve days, fell back into 
the ranks of private life. This she did with no common 
satisfaction, for when her father exhorted her to bear her fall 
with fortitude, she replied, *' This is a more welcome summons 
than that which forced me against my will to an elevation to 
which I was not entitled, and for which I was not qualified. 
In obedience to you, my lord, and to my mother, T did 
violence to myself — the present is my own act, and I wil- 
lingly resign." 

Northumberland was arrested. The last step had been 
taken, and the last step was fatal. From the height he had 
attained he was hurled down to death. He was beheaded as 
a traitor ; but the ambition of the man had involved others in 
ruin. Jane Grey and Guilford Dudley were tried, and con- 
demned to die. But execution was deferred. Their youth, 
their innocence, pleaded for life. Lady Jane had the liberty 
of the Tower granted her, and was allowed to walk in the 
queen's garden and on the hill. Lord Guilford Dudley was 
also leniently dealt with ; and so five months passed on. Then 
came the end. Wyatt's ill-judged riot brought down the 
vengeance of the queen on all who had dared to dispute her 



82 LADY JANE GREY. 

right, and among the rest on Lady Jane and her husband. 
A messenger was despatched desiring her to prepare for 
immediate death, a doom which she had long expected, and 
which her humble faith and the long train of calamities she 
had suffered, made her consider as no unwelcome tidings. She 
had early learnt to regard death as a friendly visitant. 
Lingering over the pages of the Phsedo, she had learnt the 
aspiration of the sage, that death is only another name for 
immortality ; and from God's book of wisdom she had received 
a nobler intuition of what " eye hath not seen nor ear heard." 

The queen, under a pretence of compassion for the prisoner's 
soul, sent Fakenham, Dean of St. Paul's, and other divines, 
to the unfortunate lady, with directions to aim at her con- 
version to the catholic church. By the sophistry of the 
priests she was harassed with continual disputations, and was 
even J lulf^ed with a reprieve of three days in hopes that she 
would be . .^ ^-uced during that time to return to the fold of 
Rome. The Lp.dy Jane in these sad and mournful circum- 
stances, had preseUv.. A mind sufficient not only to defend 
her religion with equal learning and eloquence, but also to 
write a letter to her sister Catherine in the Greek language, 
in which, besides sending her a copy of the New Testament 
in that tongue, she exhorted her to maintain in every condition 
a like steady and unshaken perseverance. 

It had been intended to execute Lady Jane and Lord Guilford 
Dudley together on the same scaffold at Tower hill, but the 
council fearing the compassion of the people for their youth, 
beauty, innocence, and noble birth, might excite some dan- 
gerous commotion, thought proper to alter their resolution, 
and gave orders that she should be beheaded within the verge 
of the Tower. On the morning of her execution. Lord Guil- 
ford requested a final interview with her, but she declined a 



LADY JANE GREY. 83 

scene which she thought would too strongly excite the feelings 
of hoth, and intimated to him hy message, that the fortitude 
and tranquillity of mind which should disarm their approach- 
ing fate of its sting, would rather be shaken than confirmed 
by that interview which he so affectionately desired. It would 
rather, she said, foment their grief than be a comfort in death, 
and that they would shortly meet in a better place and happier 
estate. Lord Guilford acquiesced in the propriety of her 
observations, and as he passed near the window of her apart- 
ment in his way to Tower hill, she gave him a farewell look of 
ineffable complacency and dignity. In a short time she 
witnessed the melancholy spectacle of his headless body, which 
the executioners were bringing back for interment.* 

Sir John Gage, constable of the Tower, when he led her to 
execution, requested her to favour him with some small present, 
which he might preserve as a perpetual memorial " ^^^.' She 
gave him her table-book in which she had jus' k>atten three 
sentences on seeing her husband's de"'^ ^ody' ; one in Greek, 
another in Latin, and a third in EngiiSli. The meaning of 
them was that human justice militated against his body, but 
the divine mercy would be propitious to his soul ; that if her 
fault merited punishment, her youth, at least, and her impru- 
dence, might plead her excuse ; and that God and posterity, 
she hoped, would shew her favour. 

When conducted to the scaffold she respectfully addressed 
the spectators, who were all dissolved in tears at the depressing 
spectacle. Her crime, she said, was not the having seized a 
crown, but the not refusing it with sufficient resolution : that 
her error was less the effect of ambition, than of reverence and 
duty to her parents, whom she had always been taught to 
honour and obey ; that she willingly submitted to death, as the 
* Lyttleton. 



84 



LADY JANE GREY. 



only compensatien she could make to the injured state ; and 
though her violation of the laws had been only the effect of 
compulsion and force, she would shew by her voluntary sub- 
mission to their sentence, that she was desirous of expiating 
the crime, into which too much filial piety had betrayed her : 
that she justly merited this punishment, for having been made 
the instrument, though the unwilling instrument, of the am- 
bitious views of others ; and that the story of her life, she 
hoped, might at least be productive of advantage, that it would 
serve as a lasting memorial to prove that even innocence can 
be no excuse for those actions which tend to the prejudice 
of the public. 

In countenance she was nothing cast down ;* neither her 
eyes moistened any-way with tears, although her gentlewo- 
men, Elizabeth Tilney, and Mistress Helen, " wonderfully 
wept." She, with astonishing firmness and composure caused 
herself to be disrobed, and having bound a handkerchief over 
her eyes, knelt down and laid her head upon the block. The 
axe gleamed for a moment in the sunshine, there was a dull 
heavy blow, and the life of Lady Jane had ended. " Never 
was more innocent blood shed ; never was purer virtue sacri- 
ficed ; never was eternal justice more wounded or violated." 

Such is the story of Lady Jane Grey, the twelve-days' queen. 
A short hapless life was hers. Not yet seventeen when she 
submitted her neck to the stroke of the executioner ; she had 
seen strange vicissitudes of fortune. Happy for her had she 
never quitted Bradgate ; happy for her had her lot been cast 
in a humbler sphere of life ; happy for her had she never 
entered kings' palaces. If all the world's a stage, and all the 
men and women in it players, what a dismal tragedy was that 
in which this unfortunate woman played chief character! 
* De Thou. 




.■i.'yyxyy-y.y/y ,-y, y/.^^ 



FRANCES BUENEY. 



It sometimes happens that a whole family becomes famous 
for distinguished abilities. But this is the exception, not the 
rule. In most cases one is the bright particular star, and the 
other members of the family receive reflected glory, and are 
not themselves a galaxy of brightness ; but still the literary 
firmament is not without its clusters, and such an one is aflPorded 
in the case of the Burneys. 

Dr. Burney was the organist at Lynn, and had written a 
history of music. He was the friend and companion of the 
great men of his time ; and among his distinguished visitorswere 
David Garrick, Sir Robert Strange, Mason and Armstrong the 
poets, and Barry the painter. One of the Doctor's sons rose 
to be an admiral, accompanied Captain Cook in two of his 
voyages, and was the author of a history of voyages of dis- 
covery, in five volumes quarto, and also an account of the 
Russian eastern voyages. Another son, Charles, became a 
celebrated Greek scholar, and wrote several critical works on 
the Greek classics ; he was a Prebendary of Lincoln, and one 
of the king's chaplains. Both of the daughters were novelists. 
But even in a galaxy one star may differ from another star in 
glory ; and brighter than all the rest shone the fame of 
Frances Burney. The history of music may be supplanted by 
a more external and more detailed chronicle ; discoveries and 
voyages of a more entertaining character may be written than 
the five volumes quarto of Admiral James Burney ; more criti- 
cally critical books may be made on the Greek classics than 

I 



86 FRANCES BURNEY. 

those of his brother, but the works of Frances Burney will 
never cease to be the delight of all lovers of fiction. 

Frances Burney was born on the 13th of June, 1752 — 
one hundred and one years ago, at Lynn Regis, in the county 
of Norfolk. When she was eight years old her father removed 
to London, and became, as we have said, the friend and com- 
panion of the great men of the time. Fanny soon began to 
exhibit a shrewdness and intelligence beyond her years. She 
was an infant prodigy. Now in most cases infant prodigies 
turn out adult dunces. Prematurely wise, they fall into pre- 
mature decay, and, like forced flowers, bloom when none 
others bloom, but fade when others blossom. This was not the 
case with Frances Burney. She early became an authoress ; im- 
mortalised herself in printer's ink at fifteen, had written several 
tales, was a great reader, and even a critic. But it v/as all 
done in secret. Miss Burney did not shout into the world's 
ear that she was a weilder of the goose quill ; she did not stand 
before an admiring throng, and say, " Look at me, all leo- 
hunters, I am an authoress, I wrote the fiction that made you 
smile and weep, I stirred up the torpid passions of your 
nature ; I, Frances Burney, miss in her teens !" She 
kept the matter quiet, even the good doctor knew nothing 
about it, and little supposed that his own quiet modest 
daughter was writing herself into public favour ; that little 
Fanny was already highly popular. In this way, it is said, 
she composed " Evelina" when she was only seventeen. Of 
this she has furnished an amusing account, in her interview 
with George III. She tells us how she went to see that mon- 
arch, with a Mrs. Delaney, and what took place is sufficiently 
entertaining to merit a place here. 

*' The king went up to the table and looked at a book of 
prints, from Claude Lorraine, which had been brought down 



FRANCES BURNEY. 87 

for Miss Dewes, but Mrs. Delaney told him they were for me. 
He turned over a leaf or two, and then said ; — 

" ' Pray does Miss Burney draw, too V 

" This too was pronounced very civilly. 

" * I believe not, sir,' answered Mrs. Delaney, * at least she 
does not tell.' 

" ' Oh !' cried the king, ' that is nothing, she is not apt to 
tell, she never does tell, you know, her father told me that 
himself. He told me the whole history of her " Evelina," 
and I shall never forget his face, when he spoke of his feelings 
at first taking up the book ; he looked quite frightened, just 
as if he was doing it that moment. I never can forget his face 
while I live.' 

" Then coming up close to me he said, ' but what ! what ! 
how was it ? ' 

" * Sir,' cried I, not well understanding him. 

" * How came you, how happened it — what — what ? ' 

*' ' I — I only wrote, sir, for my own amusement — only in 
some odd idle hours.' 

" * But your publishing — your printing — how was that ? ' 

" ' That was only, sir, — only because — ' 

" I hesitated most abominably, not knowing how to tell him 
a long story, and growing terribly confused at these questions. 
Besides, to say the truth, his own what ! what ! so reminded 
me of those vile probationary odes, that in the midst of all my 
flutter, I was really hardly able to keep my countenance. 

" The what was then repeated with so earnest a look, that 
forced me to say something ; I stammeringly answered, ' I 
thought sir, it would look very well in print.' 

" I do really flatter myself this is the silliest speech I ever 
made ; I am quite provoked with myself for it, but a fear of 
laughing made me eager to utter anything, and by no means 
conscious, till I had spoken, what I was saying. 



OO FRANCES BURNEY. 

" He laughed very heartily himself — well he might- — and 
walked away to enjoy it, crying out, ' very fair indeed ; that's 
heing very fair and honest.' 

" Then returning to me again, he said, * hut your father — - 
how came you not to show him what you wrote ? ' 

" ' I was too much ashamed of it, sir, seriously.' 

*' ' And how did he find it out ? ' 

'* ' I do not know myself, sir ; he never would tell me.' 

" ' But how did you get it printed ? ' 

" ' I sent it, sir, to a bookseller my father never employed, 
and that I never had seen myself — Mr. Lowndes, in full hopes 
that by that means, he never would hear of it.' 

" ' But how could you manage that ? ' 

" ' By means of a brother, sir.' 

*' ' Oh, you confided in a brother, then ? ' 

" * Yes sir — that is for the publication.' 

'* ' What entertainment you must have had from hearing peo- 
ple's conjectures before you were known ! Do you remember 
any of them ? ' 

" ' Yes sir, many.' 

" * And what ?' 

" ' I heard that Mr. Baretty laid a wager it was written by 
a man, for no woman, he said, could have kept her own coun- 
sel.' 

" This diverted him extremely. 

*' ' But how was it,' he continued, *you thought it most likely 
for your father to discover you ? ' 

" ' Sometimes, sir, I have supposed I must have dropped 
some of the manuscript ; sometimes that one of ray sisters be- 
trayed me.' 

" ' Oh, your sister ? what ! not your brother 1 ' 

" * No, sir, he could not for — ' 



FRANCES BURNEY. 89 

" I was going on, but he laughed so much, I could not be 
heard, exclaiming — 

" ' Vastly well ! I see you are of Mr. Baretty's mind, and 
think your brother could keep your secret, and not your sister. 
Well but,' cried he presently, ' how was it first known to you, 
you were betrayed ? ' 

" ' By a letter, sir, from another sister. I was very ill, 
and in the country, and she wrote me word, my father had 
taken up a review, in which the book was mentioned, and put 
his finger upon its name, and said, Contrive to get that book 
for me.' 

" ' And when he got it,' cried the king, * he told me he 
was afraid of looking at it ; and never can I forget his face, 
when he mentioned his first opening it. But you have not 
kept your pen unemployed all this time ? ' 

" ' Indeed I have, sir.' 

" * But why ? ' 

" ' I — I believe I have exhausted myself, sir.' 

" He laughed aloud at this, and went and told it to Mrs. 
Delaney, civilly treating a plain fact, as a mere hon mot.'' 

*' Then returning to me again, he said more seriously, ' but 
you have not determined against writing any more ? ' 

'' ' N 0, sir.' 

** 'You have made no vow — no real resolution of that sort ? ' 

" * No, sir.' 

" ' You only wait for inclination ? ' 

" *No, sir.' 

"A very little bow spoke him pleased with this answer ; 
and he went again to the middle of the room, where he chiefly 
stood, and addressing us in general, talked upon the different 
motives of writing, concluding with, ' I believe there is no 
constraint put upon real genius ; nothing hut inclination can 

I 2 



90 FRANCES BURKEY. 

set it to work ; But Miss Burney, however, knows best ;' and 
then hastily returning to me, he cried, ' what ! what!' 

" ' No, sir, I — I believe not, certainly,' quoth I very awk- 
wardly, for I seemed taking a violent compliment only as my 
due, but I knew not how to put him off, as I could another 
person." 

Little Fanny's novel created quite a sensation. The work 
had been offered to Dodsley, but had been rejected, as he de- 
clined looking at anything anonymous. Lowndes had agreed 
to publish it, and had given £20 for the manuscript. It was 
the talk of the town. Evelina ; or, a Young Lady's entrance 
into the World, was the topic of the day ; whether the au- 
thoress went to London, Bath, or Tunbridge, she still listened 
to her own praises ; and even Leonine Johnson protested that 
there were passages in the book which might do honour to 
Richardson. 

In 1782 came out " Cecilia," Miss Burney's second work. 
This work has more of the artist about it. It is not so humo- 
rous ; perhaps not quite so natural, either in character, inci- 
dent, or dialogue, but it is far more highly finished than Eve- 
lina. Miss Burney, shortly after the publication of her second 
work, paid a visit to Mr. Delaney, an intimate of the Dean 
of St. Patrick's, and a favourite of their majesties. Thus it 
was that our authoress was introduced to the king, and became 
a visitor at Windsor Castle. Their majesties were highly 
pleased with her. She was subsequently appointed second 
keeper of the robes to Queen Charlotte, with a salary of .£200 
per annum, a footman, and a carriage between herself and 
colleague, a colleague by the way, with whom she had no sym- 
pathy. 

The duties of keeper of the robes would appear to be but 
light and easy. But appearances are often deceptive. Life 



r i ;,:,i liT 



FRANCES BURNEY. 91 

in the palace seems an enviable destiny ; but the seeming is 
hugely erroneous. The first duty of Miss Burney was, to 
mix the queen's snuff; a post worthy of the authoress of 
" Evelina ;" a high favour this, to judiciously mix the tobacco 
which should tickle the nostrils of majesty ; but her duties 
afterwards became more onerous. She had to remain in con- 
stant attendance upon Charlotte, from six in the morning, till 
twelve at night ; ready at any moment to assist her in arrang- 
ing her dress. High preferment, this ! noble duty, this ! to 
leave the quiet home, and the well-loved labour, for the cham- 
ber of the palace ; and to quit book making, for the arrange- 
ment of boddices and skirts, and hooks and eyes, and snuff 
mixing ! 

The situation of robe-keeper was only a sort of splendid 
slavery. Chains are chains, though they be golden. It 
was a grinding and intolerable destiny for one who had been 
courted and flattered ; for though the queen was a kind mis- 
tress, the duties were irksome, and the stiff etiquette of the 
court banished all comfort. 

At last, a French refugee officer wooed and won the fair 
authoress, and Miss Burney became Madame D'Arblay. In 
1793, she produced a tradegy, taken from the old Saxon re- 
cord, and called, "Edwin and Elgitha." They say it is only 
one step from the sublime to the ridiculous, and deep tradegy 
may become broad farce : in the death-scene of the queen in 
Madame D'Arblay's tradegy, the heroine is brought from be- 
hind a hedge to expire, and then carried back again to lie still 
till the play is over. The house was convulsed with laughter ! 

At the peace of Amiens, Madame D'Arblay went with her 
husband to Paris, and, he having joined the army of Napoleon, 
remained there through the greater part of the subsequent 
war. In 1812, she returned to England, and purchased a 



92 FRANCES ^BURNEY. 

villa, which she christened Camilla Cottage ; even as Mrs. 
StQwe has christened her new little mansion by the name of 
the " Cabin I" In 1814, came out the " Wanderer,'* a wan- 
derer through five whole volumes ! By this work alone, the 
authoress realised £1500. In 1832, she published the me- 
moirs of her father, Dr. Burney, a very interesting book. 

Madame D'Arblay pictured the life of the last century. She 
was a terrible foe to vulgarly-genteel people ; and though her 
characters rusticated at Brightelmstone, and mingled with the 
world of fashion, at Ranelagh and Mary-le-bone Gardens, 
there is enough of reality about them to commend them to 
posterity. Madame D'Arblay lived to a good old age — eighty- 
eight, — and died in the year 1840, 



ANNE BOLETN, 



Once upon a time, as the old stories begin, there was a 
brave leader, and a gallant soldier, wise in the council, valiant 
in the field, — named, Sir Thomas Boleyn. Some called him 
Bullen, or, as it was originally written, Boulen, for he was of 
French descent ; but call him by what name you would, a 
truer man never wore golden spurs. His wife was the Lady 
Elizabeth Howard, daughter of the Earl of Surrey. This 
brought Sir Thomas into close connexion with royalty, for his 
wife's brother married the sister of Henry the seventh's queen. 
He was a favourite with Henry VIII., who bestowed upon 
him many preferments. To the knight was born a daughter ; 
and at Blickling Hall, in Norfolk, Anne Boleyn first saw light. 
There are strange superstitions still hanging about the place, 
and one room, called Old Bullen's study, was long shut up on 
account of a domestic spectre. 

The early life of Anne Boleyn was spent at Blickling. The 
family afterwards removed to Hever Castle, Kent. In the year 
1512, Anne lost her mother, whom she dearly loved, and Sir 
Thomas afterwards married a Norfolk woman, of humble 
origin. The education of Anne Boleyn was superintended by 
a French governess ; and she early became a maid of honour 
in the retinue of Princess Mary Tudor, youngest sister of 
Henry VIII., when that princess was affianced to Louis XIL, 
of France. She afterwards entered the service of the consort 
of Francis I., a sober-minded queen, little assimilating to the 
manners of her volatile maid. Chateaubriant has left a 



94 ANNE BOLEYN. 

description of the characteristics of Anne Boleyn, and they are 
strangely different from those of the queen, who marched her 
maids to mass each day, and kept them afterwards, in holy 
conversation, at the spinning-wheel. 

*' She possessed," he says, " a great talent for poetry ; and 
when she sung, like a second Orpheus, she would have made 
bears and wolves attentive. She likewise danced the English 
dances, leaping and jumping with infinite grace and agility. 
Moreover, she invented many new figures and steps, which are 
yet known by her name, or by those of the gallant partners 
with whom she danced them. She was well-skilled in all 
games fashionable at courts. Besides singing like a syren, 
accompanying herself on the lute, she harped better than King 
David, and handled cleverly both flute and rebec. She dressed 
with marvellous taste, and devised new modes, which were 
followed by the fairest ladies of the French court ; but none 
wore them with her gracefulness, in which she rivalled 
Venus." 

Anne Boleyn afterwards exchanged the sober service of the 
queen of Francis I. for the gay splendours of the court of 
Margaret of Alen^on, and in 1522 returned to England. At 
Hever Castle the real drama of her life began. She was beau- 
tiful in person, graceful in demeanour, and accustomed to the 
society of the great. As she walked in the gardens of her 
father's mansion, she accidentally encountered the king. He en- 
tered into conversation with her, was charmed with her sprightly 
wit, and, on his return to Westminster, told Wolsey that he 
had been discoursing with a young lady who had the wit of an 
angel, and was worthy of a crown. And never from the mind 
of Henry departed the image of his new love ; her tall and 
slender figure, her oval face and black hair, the glow of health 
on her cheek, the brightness in her eyes, the smile upon her 



ANNE BOLEYN. 95 

lips he could never forget. She was soon engaged in the suite 
of Queen Catherine, when she became the cynosure of all eyes, 
the envy of the one sex, and the admiration of the other. 
Suitors pressed around her ; but one there was who watched 
with a jealous eye. Lord Percy was the favoured one, and the 
king hated him with a deadly hatred. Percy was affianced to 
Anne Boleyn ; but what of that to the monarch. He sent for 
Wolsey, and commanded him to put an end to the engagement. 
It was a hard matter, but it was done ; the contract was dis- 
solved, and Percy became the husband of Mary Talbot. Anne 
Boleyn was dismissed from the court, for which she vowed to 
be revenged on the cardinal. So she dwelt in privacy at 
Hever Castle, moodily brooding over her wrongs : and when 
the king paid an unexpected visit, was so indignant, that she 
took to her bed, and refused to see him. This, of course, in- 
creased the passion of the royal lover. Henry had flattered 
himself, that he had only to signal his favour to obtain a con- 
quest ; and he found that, in love, kings are but men, and 
must seek favour with their lady-loves like others. He began 
to do this, by elevating Sir Thomas Boleyn to the peerage, by 
the style and title of Viscount Rochford ; and bestowed upon 
him, the high office of treasurer of the royal household. But 
Anne refused to be reinstated In the post of maid of honour ; 
she still manifested a persevering resentment ; and not till 
1527, did she again appear at court. Then Henry presented 
her with jewels, and then made an avowal of his passion, but 
the proposals of the king were rejected with abhorrence ; and 
when the monarch ventured to say, he should still continue to 
hope, Anne answered : — 

*' I understand not, most mighty king, how you should 
retain such hope ; your wife I cannot be, both in respect of 
my unworthiness, and also, because you have a queen already. 
— Your mistress I will not be !" 



96 ANNE BOLEYN. 

This only served further to inflame the passion of the mo- 
narch ; so long letters were written to mollify her ruffled 
spirit, — letters, which are still preserved for the world to look 
at. Thus assured of the king's favour, and deep in the king's 
secrets, she began to look very haughty, for the time seemed 
coming, when she should have her revenge on her old enemy, 
the cardinal. 

As Anne began to exhibit this temper, the courtiers adopted 
the same course, and Wolsey, shrewd, cunning as he was, saw 
the black cloud no bigger than a man's hand, that threatened 
to shut out his sunshine, and bring adversity's storm upon 
him. A question was being secretly agitated, and in myste- 
rious whispers men began to talk about the king's secret 
matter. This was the question of his divorce from Catherine. 
Every day his love for Anne increased ; every day fresh mani- 
festations were given of how she ruled his heart. At the 
grand masque at Greenwich, on the 5th of May, 1527, he 
selected her for his partner, and so clear and evident became 
his attachment to the maid of honour, that Catherine upbraided 
him with his perfidy. While Wolsey was in Fiance the 
influence of Anne became still greater. The courtiers thronged 
around her, and worshipped the rising sun. 

Anne felt the charm of power. In the glory of the throne 
she saw not the dark prospect that lay beyond. She trifled 
with the gallants of the court, but not as she had done with 
the Lord Percy ; she toyed with them, and encouraged just far 
enough to awaken the rivalry of the monarch, but not far 
enough to bring down his vengeance. Meanwhile the secret 
matter became a public matter. The king sought to divorce 
his wife. Catherine had been the wife of his brother, was it 
lawful for him to have his brother's wife ? He never thought 
of that till the light of Boleyn's eyes shone on the matter, and 



ANNE BOLEYN. 97 

in their lustre he saw his error. Henry wrote a treatise on 
the illegality of his present union, and in his pride of heart 
shewed it to Sir Thomas More, who said he could not give 
any opinion on its merits, seeing he did not understand 
theology. So the king sent it to the pope. 

It was about this period that a horrible disease broke out, 
called the sweating sickness. Thousands and thousands 
perished, and men thought they heard in it the voice of God 
thundering against the monarch who was about to deny the 
wife of his youth. Henry himself imagined this to be the 
case, and effecting a temporary reconciliation with Catherine, 
attended certain penitential services, and sent Anne Boleyn 
home to her father at Hever Castle. But his amatory corres- 
pondence was still continued. From the chapel, with its 
burning tapers, and dim religious light, he stole away to his 
own private rooms, and wrote loving letters to the gentle 
Anne. Here is one of them : — 

*' My Mistress and my Friend, 
" My heart and I surrender ourselves into your hands, and 
we supplicate to be commended to your good graces, and that 
by absence your affections may not be diminished to us. For 
that would be to augment our pain, which would be a great 
pity, since absence gives enough, and more than I ever 
thought could be felt. This brings to my mind a fact in 
Astronomy, which is, that the further the poles are from the 
sun, notwithstanding the more scorching is his heat. Thus is 
it with our love ; absence has placed distance between us, 
nevertheless fervour increases, at least on my part. I hope 
the same from you ; assuring you that in my case the anguish 
of absence is so great, that it would be intolerable, were it not 
for the firm hope I have of your indissoluble affection towards 

K 



98 ANNE BOLEYN. 

me. In order to remind you of it, and because I cannot in 
person be in your presence, I send you the thing which comes 
nearest that is possible, that is to say, my picture, and the 
whole device, which you already know of, set in bracelets, 
wishing myself in their places when it pleases you. This is 
from the hand of 

" Your servant and friend, 

The king became alarmed for her health, and she was 
indeed seized with the epidemic, when Henry sent his 
own physician. Dr. Butts, to attend her ; and the shadow of 
death passed over her, but left her for a still darker destiny. 
Meanwhile the love of Henry for Anne increased, and when 
the epidemic passed away, he renewed his application for a 
divorce ; and so wroth was he with Wolsey for the long delay, 
that he is said to have employed "terrible terms*' to him. 
At last the monarch declared to Anne Boleyn that it was his 
intention to make her his queen, as soon as he was released 
from his present marriage. The room at Hever Castle, 
where the declaration was made, is still shewn. She appeared 
again at court, and the French ambassador notes in his report, 
— " Mademoiselle de Boleyn has at last returned to court, and 
I believe the king to be so infatuated with her, that God alone 
can stay his madness." Catherine was sent to Greenwich, 
and Anne installed in a gorgeous suite of apartments contigu- 
ous to those of the king. 

So the process of divorce was carried on ; but law's delays 
are tedious. The pope sent his legates, and the Legatine 
court was established at Bridewell. The residence of Anne at 
the court was a cause of great scandal, and the king procured 
for her a splendid mansion, apart from his own ; but when, at 



ANNE BOLEYN. 99 

Christmas time, he went to Greenwich, Anne went with him, 
and while in one part of the palace Catherine held her court, 
Anne in another part gave masques and revels to the courtiers. 
In 1529, Bishop Gardiner was dispatched to Eome to plead 
for the divorce, for the king was becoming every day more 
impatient. It was about this time that Cranmer was 
brought forward. His eloquence and learning had attracted 
the notice of Gardiner, he spake so strongly on the subject 
of the divorce, that Gardiner communicated the same 
to the king ; saying, the young man proposed appealing from 
Rome to the most learned of the universities in Europe, to 
test thereby the validity of the marriage. "Ah," quoth 
Henry, " thou hast gotten the right sow by the ear." 

Cranmer became a great favourite with Anne Boleyn, and 
his gentle mistress — for she took him into her service — was 
induced to read an English Bible. That book she lent to one 
of her maids of honour ; that maid of honour in a " love trick" 
lost the book, and her lover retaining it by force, was reading 
it one day in the royal chapel ; a fellow-courtier, wondering 
to see him thus employed, snatched it from his hands, and lo ! 
the rank heresy was apparent — it was God's word in mother 
tongue. The courtier carried the book to the cardinal, who 
kept it by him to serve his purpose in the coming struggle ; 
but Anne, hearing what had occurred, went to the king, and 
told him all. He commanded the churchman to give up the 
book, a request with which he was forced to comply; and 
Anne, once more in possession of her treasure, entreated the 
king to examine it. Anne was a protestant ; or, at least, she 
was becoming heretical to her own church, and the king loved 
her, and her faith for her sake. 

Anne was now in open hostility with the cardinal. The 
courtiers flowed with the tide of favour. Sacerdotal vestments 



100 ANNE BOLEYN. 

and scarlet hats could not save liim. His proud spirit must 
bow: 

"Begot by butchers, but by bishops bred, 
How haughtily his highness holds his head." 

But his haughty highness was on the verge of a downfall. 
The cardinal fell into disgrace. A rival power had crossed 
his star ; and the end came on. Higher and higher arose 
Anne Boleyn, and lower and lower sank the churchman ; he 
to a grave, she to a crown ; he to rest, she to disquiet ; his 
dream of glory was over, her dream of glory just beginning, 
a dream of glory that ended in a direful night-mare. The 
•cardinal was arrested, and died a prisoner; and Anne kept 
Christmas with the splendour of a queen. 

It was about this period, however, that a strange incident 
occurred. One night Anne found in her chamber a book, 
professing to be of a prophetic character. She glanced at the 
oracular hieroglyphic, and saw by the letters attached to the 
various figures, that her own destiny was marked out. Those 
initials meant something. H. K. A. might stand for Henry, 
Katherine, Anne. She called her principal attendant. 

" Come hither. Nan," said she, " see here is a book of 
prophecies. This is the king ; this is the queen wringing her 
hands and mourning ; and this is myself, with ray head cut off." 

*'If I thought the prophecy were true," said Nan, "I 
would not have him, if he were an emperor." 

" Tut, Nan, the book is but a bauble, and I am resolved to 
have him, that my issue may be royal, whatever may become 
of me." 

So the matter of the divorce went on. All England was in 
an uproar ; all Europe was shaken. Some folk declared for 
the gentle Anne ; some for the sober-minded Catherine ; some 



ANNE BOLEYN. 101 

for both. Luther himself declared that he would rather allow 
the king to have two wives, than dissolve his first union. 
Wherever went the king, thither went Anne. The dazzling 
prospect of a crown was before her, and shut out the scaf- 
fold that lay beyond. The royal lover was continually be- 
stowing upon her rich presents, as we find from his privy 
purse expenses. Among the rest the following : — 

£ s. d. 
Item, paid to John Maiti, for twelve yards of black 

satin, for a cloak for my Lady Anne, at 8s. per yard 4 16 
For making the same cloak . . . . ,050 
A yard of black velvet for edging the same . . 13 4 

Three yards and three quarters of black velvet, to 

line the collar and arm holes 1 16 

Two yards of black satin, to line the sleeves of the 

same cloak, at 8s. the yard 16 

Eleven yards of Bruges satin, to line the rest of the 

cloak, at 2s. 4d, the yard 15 8 

Tv/o yards of buckram, to line the upper sleeves of 

the same cloak 2 



The whole cost of the cloak is . . . . £9 14 



The monarch not only bestowed upon her such marks as 
this of his royal favour, but he did what never monarch yet 
had done, created his lady-love a peeress in her own right, 
under the title of Marchioness of Pembroke. In the architec- 
tural buildings then in progress, the initial cyphers of Anne 
and Henry were introduced, entwined with a true-lover's knot= 
He also bestowed upon her a grant of certain lands in Wales, 
and in the entries of the privy purse are £12,000 for jewels^ 
supposed to be for my Lady Anne. Together they sojourned 
at Calais in high state, playing *' right royally" at cards and 
dice, for Anne was a lover of play and a fortunate gamester.^ 



102 A1«NE BOLEYN. 

Thus in a single-handed game of cards with her royal lover, 
she won £11. 13s. 4d., duly entered in the king's expenses, 
as lost at play to my Lady Anne. 

At length the king was privately married to Anne Boleyn. 
The time and place are disputed points. The new queen 
remained in great retirement, for as yet the public mind was 
not prepared for the change. When matters had been 
arranged, and Henry had determined to cast off the Roman 
yoke, Cranmer publicly pronounced sentence in the divorce 
case so long pending, a sentence which declared the marriage 
with Catherine to be null and void, and five days after gave a 
judicial confirmation to the second union of the king. 

Preparations were immediately made for her coronation as 
queen. The Lord Mayor and civic dignitaries were sum- 
moned to Greenwich to fetch the queen to the Tower, and the 
broad bosom of the Thames became the scene of her public 
triumph. The pageant we need not describe, nor tell of the 
goodly harmony which was made, nor how marvellous peals 
of guns were shot ofi" in honour of the new queen. With her 
royal attendants she took part in that gay procession on the 
water, and at the Tower-stairs was met by Henry himself, 
who kissed her tenderly before the court. 

For some days Anne Boleyn remained in the Tower, during 
which time seventeen young noblemen were made Knights of 
the Bath, and appointed as attendants at her coronation. 
Then city streets were gravelled from the Tower to Temple 
Bar, and railed on one side so that the people should not be 
hurt by the horses ; Cornhill and Gracechurch-street were 
brave in scarlet cloth and velvet hangings, and Stephen 
Peacock, Mayor of London, went to receive the queen at the 
Tower. What a gorgeous show it was ! how 'prentice boys 
cast up their caps and shouted for Queen Anne ; how in 



ANNE BOLEYN. 103 

Gracechurch-street the E-henisli wine ran all day long ; how 
every conduit ran with wine, and the air was made melodious 
\vith sweet sounds ; and how in her litter of state came Anne 
all bright and beautiful ; how splendid was the coronation 
that followed — chroniclers have told, and we need not here 
recount. 

The Pope fulminated his interdicts, and summoned Henry to 
Rome, but Henry had married a wife, and could not come. So 
there were jousts and tournaments and great gay doings, and 
the court continued to be one scene of festivity. What of the 
prophecy book now ? The initial of Anne was on the gold 
and silver coinage, and she reigned as a queen. At length she 
became a mother. But to the great disappointment of Henry 
a daughter was born. This child was afterwards Queen 
Elizabeth. So confident had the king been of a son, that in 
the circular which had been previously prepared to send 
round to the nobility, the word prince was written, and when 
the event occurred an s was added. 

Then came the question of the king's supremacy. The 
courtiers were required totake the oath ; and, for nonconformity, 
Fisher, Bishop of Rochester, and Sir Thomas More, died on 
the scaffold. The queen liked not Sir Thomas More, and 
when Margaret Roper visited the good old man in prison, and 
he asked her " How Queen Anne did ?" " In faith, father, 
never better," she replied, " never better. There is nothing 
else in the court but dancing and sporting." " Never better," 
said he, " alas ! Meg, alas ! it pitieth me to think into what 
misery, poor soul, she will shortly come. These dances of 
hers will prove such dances that she will spurn our heads off 
like foot balls ; but it will not be long ere her head will dance 
the like dance." A tragedy sometimes begins with a wedding. 

But a change came over the mind of the queen. She 



104 ANNE BOLEYN. 

forgot her vivacity. She grew serious and sedate. The 
words of Latimer, the reformation preacher, had entered her 
heart. She espoused the cause of protestantism, and became 
eminent for her christian zeal. Yet pride and vengeance were 
not dead, but sleeping. She was at the summit of glory. 
Wolsey was dead, Catherine uncrowned, herself triumphant. 
When she heard of the death of the queen, she clapped her 
hands for joy, and handsomely rewarded the messenger ; and 
when Henry commanded royal mourning, she disobeyed the 
order and appeared in yellow. But fortune's wheel was 
turning. With the measure ye mete it shall be measured to 
you again. Jane Seymour, one of the maids of honour, had 
attracted the king's attention. The play was beginning afresh. 
Anne saw it, felt it ; her grief and indignation knew no bounds. 
Her agitation was so great that the king was troubled. She 
was again a mother, but the mother of a dead son. The 
rage of the king was terrible ; he burst into the apartment of 
his consort, and upbraided her with the loss of the boy. Anne 
saw it all. Her star of glory was eclipsed. Her dream of 
glory was fast ending. In secluded spots, in Greenwich Park, 
she wandered all alone ; deep melancholy settled on her spirits, 
and she had no relish for the gaieties of the court. Then 
rumour whispered to the king that Anne was inconstant. 
Inconstant ! who so inconstant and fickle as he ? Doubt and sus- 
picion were aroused ; doubt and suspicion, two arrant knaves, 
that only sought an opportunity to hurl the gentle woman down 
to death and infamy. She loved others, so it was said, she con- 
versed freely with the gentlemen of the king's household ; all the 
petty spite and idle scandal of the court was poured into the 
ear of Henry. A plot was being formed. Every circumstance 
told in its favour. A secret committee of the House of Peers 
was employed to examine evidence against the queen. She 



ANNE BOLEYN. 105 

knew it not. On the first of May she appeared with her royal 
consort, at the jousts at Greenwich. There the sports were 
suddenly broken up ; her brother, Lord Rochford, and others, 
were arrested. That day, as the queen sat at dinner, the 
Duke of Norfolk, with Audley, Cromwell, and others of the 
council entered. She asked them why they came, and they 
answered, that they came, by the king's command, to 
conduct her to the Tower, there to remain during his highness's 
pleasure. The broad bosom of the Thames was the scene of 
her disgrace ; and as the boat floated under the dark entrance 
of the old fortress, Anne fell on her knees, " Lord, help me, 
as I am guiltless of that whereof I am accused." She wept 
and laughed, a laugh more terrible than the weeping, and 
cried in her agony, *' Jesus, have mercy on me !" 

A sad, sad change for the new queen, these lodgings in the 
Tower. They were the same that she had dwelt in previous 
to her coronation ; but oh, how changed. There she passed 
the weary days, and wearier nights, guarded, watched, betrayed; 
now laughing, now weeping, now moody, now gay and talka- 
tive ; but always subsiding into deep grief. Then came her 
trial. What the evidence was is unknown. That it was con- 
flicting and unsatisfactory, is certain ; but it ended in the con- 
demnation of Anne Boleyn. She was pronounced guilty ; 
required to lay aside her crown, which she did, and then heard 
the sentence, that she be burnt or beheaded as the king thought 
fit. But there was a higher tribunal, and to that tribunal 
Anne Boleyn appealed — " Father, Creator, Thou art the 
way, the truth, and the life, Thou knowest I have not deserved 
this death !" 

The next scene of the tragedy is a certain low chapel or 
crypt, in Cranmer's house, at Lambeth. There Anne appeared, 
in obedience to a summons, and admitted a pre-contract of 



106 ANNE BOLEYN. 

her marriage with my Lord Percy ; this was taken to prove 
that the king's marriage with her was, in consequence, null 
and void, and that the Princess Elizabeth was illegitimate. 
Cranmer sat in judraent on the occasion, and Anne submitted 
to the degradation to save herself from burning, which his 
highness, the king, proposed. 

Then Anne sat in her prison waiting for death. She had 
hoped that the king would pardon her ; that he would com- 
mute her sentence ; but her hope was vain. So the Lady 
Anne sung her own dirge in strange old stanzas of her own 
composing : — 

" Oh death, rock me asleep, 

Bring on my quiet rest, 
Let pass my very guiltless ghost 

Out of my careful breast. 
Ring out the doleful knell, 
Let its sound my death tell ; 

For I must die, 

There is no remedy, 

For now I die ! 

My pains who can express, 

Alas ! they are so strong ! 
My dolour will not suffer strength, 

My life for to prolong. 
Alone, in prison strange ! 

I wait my destiny ; 

Woe worth this curel hap that I 

Should taste this misery. 

Farewell my pleasures past, 

"Welcome my present pain, 
I feel my torments so increase, 

That life cannot remain. 



ANNE BOLEYN. 107 

Sound now the passing bell : 

Rung is my doleful knell, 

For its sound my death doth tell. 

Death doth draw nigh ! 

Sound the knell dolefully, 

For now I die. 

On the 19 til of May the execution took place. The queen 
protested her innocence to the moment of her death. She 
sent a message to the king, but it was not to sue for mercy. 
** Tell him," said she, " that he hath been ever constant in his 
career of advancing me ; from a private getlewoman he made 
me a marchioness ; from a marchioness a queen, and now he 
hath left no higher degree of honour, he gives my innocence 
the crown of martyrdom." At twelve at noon the queen 
appeared. Never had she looked so beautiful. She was 
dressed in mourning, and was led by the lieutenant of the 
Tower, and attended by four maids of honour. She was con- 
ducted to the scaffold, which had been erected in the green. 
There was a very host of enemies, come to see her die. Anne 
addressed the people : — " I am come hither to die, according 
to law, for by the law I am judged to die, and therefore I will 
speak nothing against it. I am come hither to accuse no 
man, nor to speak any thing of that whereof I am accused, as 
I know full well that aught that I could say in my defence 
doth not appear unto you, and that I could draw no hope of 
life from the same. But I come here only to die, and thus to 
yield myself humbly unto the will of my lord, the king. I 
pray God to save the king, and send him long to reign over 
you, for a gentler or more merciful prince was there never. 
To me he was ever a good and gracious sovereign. If any 
person will meddle with my cause, I pray them to judge the 
best. Thus I take leave of the world and of you, and I 



108 ' ANNE BOLEYN. 

heartily desire you all to pray for me." She prepared herself 
for the block, for her women were overcome with grief, and 
then in pathetic words took leave of them most lovingly. It 
is said that Anne refused to have her eyes bandaged, and that 
every time the headsman drew near, he was prevented from 
doing his office by their keen bright glance. At last he 
beckoned to one of his assistants to advance softly on one 
side, while he, with his shoes off, approached on the other. 
The queen was deceived by the sound, she turned her head in the 
direction from whence the sound proceeded, and, while for 
a moment she gazed on the assistant, the headsman lifted his 
Calais sword, and struck off her head at a blow ! 





Mlgm m®^AE. IHIl£©IHIM2Sgi 



TMIE W'WQlSLmBB ©IF MHiM^ 



THE DUCHESS OF KENT. 



**The fate of a child," said Napoleon, "is always the 
work of its mother." How much truth there is in this 
statement ! How much we all owe to a mother's teachings 
and a mother's care ! In admiring and esteeming the amiable 
qualities of our beloved sovereign, we are naturally led to think 
of her who has so faithfully discharged a mother's duties to 
our royal lady. The Duchess of Kent is worthy of all honour 
and respect, and some few particulars regarding her history 
may not be deemed inappropriate. 

She comes of an illustrious family, one of the oldest and 
noblest in Europe. Far back in the gloom of past ages we dis- 
cern the line of the Duke of Saxe-Coburg — ere Charlemagne 
had maide himself immortal. Victoria Maria Louisa is the 
daughter of the Duke of Saxe-Coburg, and sister to Leopold, 
the King of the Belgians. She was born on the 17th of 
August, 1786. 

When Victoria Maria was sixteen years of age she was 
married to the Prince Leiningen. It was not a love-match. 
The union was one of policy. She had beauty, high birth, a 
liberal education, a cultivated taste. He possessed no recom- 
mendations but wealth and rank. He was forty-four years 
old, with no redeeming quality to compensate for dissolute 
habits, and an absolutely hateful mind and heart. Those that 
sow the wind reap the whirlwind. Gold could not make amends 
for goodness — wealth is a poor equivalent ht wisdom, and 
money is a bad exchange for merit. The youthful princess 

L 



110 THE DUCHESS OF KENT. 

found herself united to a man whose habits and conduct were 
alike distasteful to her, whose principles and practices she 
utterly abhorred. Every day the estrangement between them 
became greater. She felt that she had been sacrificed to an 
unfeeling debauchee ; — he, careless and indifferent, abandoned 
her to entire neglect, and rendered her the victim of his un- 
ceasing petulance and cruelty. 

Her life was one of bitterness. Years of unspeakable 
sorrow passed over her head. Her sufferings were very great. 

" Stone walls do not a prison make, 
Nor iron bars a cage ;" 

neither do palaces make happy homes, nor gilded roofs shut 
out discomfort. Surrounded by splendour, the affection- 
ate heart of the young wife was crushed. She had no hope, 
she found no sympathy ; she was alone. He who should have 
loved and cherished her was incapable of any kindly emotion. 
So fifteen years passed away, and then the wife was widowed. 
In that which commonly brings with it the deepest desolation 
she found consolation. How great must have been her grief 
when widowhood became a solace ! 

Two years after this, his late Royal Highness the Duke of 
Kent was brought into the society of the lovely widow. In 
her he found all he had ever sought in woman. She was 
beautiful in person, cultivated in understanding, and between 
them there existed a congeniality of taste, which made him 
seek her as his bride. The Duke of Kent was one of those 
princes whose characters are great with simplicity ; uniting 
all the dignity of royal rank with the grace and ease of domes- 
tic life ; a clear solid judgment which sees its proper end, and 
pursues it by direct means ; a mind too generous for intrigue; 
a temper open, ardent, and benevolent ; in one word, one of 



THE DUCHESS OF KENT. Ill 

those men whose singular merit rendered his rank a disad- 
vantage, inasmuch as it withdrew his private virtues from that 
light and pubhcity which are only wanting to ensure them their 
due homage. 

The Duke of Kent had early distinguished himself in his 
career as a soldier. He had lived in times of peculiar peril 
and diflficulty, and had entered upon the course of duty with 
a spirit proportionate to his rank. He personally engaged 
against the enemies of his country. In the field of battle he 
had exhibited his courage. His courage was passive, as well as 
active. He knew how to lead on his troops, and he knew how to 
bide his time. '' He is the best soldier," said the witty Marshal 
Saxe, " who continues a good soldier after a shower of rain," 
There is a great deal of truth in this saying. The difficulties 
and privations of a soldier's life, are more serious hardships 
than actual conflict. How great must those hardships be to 
one accustomed to the ease and luxury of a palace. Yet the 
long life of the Duke of Kent as a meritorious officer, afford 
us a fine instance of how princely rank can be laid aside at 
the call of duty. He cheerfully incurred all the perils and 
inconveniences of long and hazardous service, the vicissitudes 
of climates, the pestilential heats of the torrid zone, and the 
no less noxious colds and damps of the American woods and 
lakes. Nobly he stood forth among our British princes. No 
one better preserved the necessary decorums of rank, where 
the order of society, and the publicity of his appearance re- 
quired them ; no one more gracefully laid them aside — more 
unostentatiously sunk into the ease and grace of private friend- 
ship and domestic confidence, when, after the discharge of his 
public duties, he returned to the circle of his friends. 

The German lady attracted his attention, and the English 
prince was an accepted suitor. They were married, and the 



112 THE DUCHESS OF KENT. 

widow of Prince Leiningen became Duchess of Kent. She 
accompanied her husband to England. Here she found warm 
friends. Here she began to understand the happiness of 
home. The domestic habits, the ardent affection, and the 
literary taste of the duke were appreciated by the new 
duchess. So a year of happiness sped on swift wings ; and 
their joy was increased by the birth of a daughter, Alexan- 
drina Victoria — our gracious queen. 

This event added considerably to the public importance of 
the duke and duchess. Their child was immediately recog- 
nized as heiress to the throne. But a sad change was at hand. 
A dark cloud was rising. The happiness of the duchess was 
too great to last. Just eight months after the birth of Vic- 
toria, her father was suddenly taken ill. It was a season of 
intense anxiety. The duchess was assiduous in her atten- 
tions, and affectionately watched beside the couch of her hus- 
band. The end was at hand. Death laid his icy hand upon 
him, and he breathed his last. For some time it was doubted 
whether the duchess would survive the shock ; so severely 
did she feel the blow. 

The House of Commons deputed a committee to present an 
address of condolence to the bereaved widow. It was a deeply- 
affecting sight. The duchess held in her arms the infant 
Victoria ; and with weeping eyes and bursting heart, listened 
to the address of the deputation. Then she presented to them 
the unconscious child, and assured them of her determination 
to consecrate all her energies to prepare the child for the dis- 
tinguished situation she seemed destined to fill. All eyes 
were suffused with tears ; all sympathized with the widowed 
mother ; all respected her sincere grief, and esteemed her 
noble character. 

The duchess well performed the promise she then made. 



THE DUCHESS OF KENT. 113 

From that hour she consecrated herself to the education of 
the young princess. In the sketch we have given of the life 
of her majesty, we have related some particulars of that edu- 
cation. We need not detail them afresh. With the duchess, 
nothing has interrupted the even tenor of her way. She is 
universally and deservedly respected; her public and her pri- 
vate virtues are well known ; and in doing honour to the 
Duchess of Kent, we esteem her own high and noble character, 
far above the fact, which, in itself, would demand our homage 
and respect — that she is the mother of our queen. 



L 2 



HANNAH MOEE. 



Hannah More was born in the memorable year 1745, at 
Stapleton, in Gloucestershire. Her father kept a respectable 
school for boys. Hannah was the eldest of five sisters. After 
residing some years at Stapleton, her father removed to Bristol, 
but he did not long survive, and Hannah was left to struggle 
for herself and sisters, the youngest of whom was not ten years 
old. Friends came forward to assist her ; among them, the 
Eev. Dr. Stonhouse ; Dr. Tucker, Dean of Gloucester ; and 
Mrs. Gwatkin, a lady of extensive connexions, and considerable 
fortune. Through their friendly patronage, Hannah More and 
her sisters established a boarding-school in Park Street. 
This was about the year 1766. Each of the sisters, who 
were of sufficient age, took their share in the management of 
the school, but the chief duty naturally devolved on Hannah. 
All acted in perfect unison, and on a regular plan. 

Hannah had always been distinguished for studious habits, 
and exemplary piety. At an early age she evinced a taste for 
literature. For the entertainment of Mrs. Gwatkin's family, 
she composed the pastoral drama of the Search after Happi- 
ness ; and before her twentieth year, wrote one or two of her 
sacred dramas : but not till long afterwards, did she appear 
before the public as an authoress. She had often been re- 
quested to publish^ but her modesty had resisted every impor- 
tunity. At length, however, her consent was given, and her 
" Pastoral," with a few miscellaneous pieces, passed through 
three editions in a few months. 



HANNAH MORE. 115 

While Hannah More was residing for a few weeks at Uphill, 
Somersetshire, for the benefit of her health, she happened to 
encounter Dr. Langhorne. Langhorne was a poet, and loved 
poetry. He had heard of Hannah More, and was rejoiced to 
see her. They walked together on the beach, and Langhorne, 
with his cane, wrote the following lines on the sand : — 

" Along the shore 

Walk'd Hannah More, 
Waves, let the record last ; 

Sooner shall ye. 

Proud earth and sea, 
Than what she writes, be past. 

John Langhorne." 

With a surprising readiness, Miss More immediately scratched 
the following answer : — 

" Some firmer basis, polish' d Langhorne, choose, 
To write the dictates of thy charming muse ; 
Her strains in solid characters rehearse, 
And be thy tablet lasting as thy verse. 

Hannah More." 

In the following year, Miss More published two poems, " Sir 
Eldred of the Bower," and " The Bleeding Rock." Con- 
cerning these publications, Garrick wrote to his friend, Dr. 
Stonhouse : — 

" Notwithstanding the great sale and reputation of Lord 
Chesterfield's Letters, it is but lately, that I had time, or indeed 
inclination, to peruse them : when I was told, that his lordship, 
as a part of polite education, forbids his son to laugh, (for I am 
vulgar enough to take all opportunities to show that distinction 
between us and the brutes,) I was not so eager as the rest of 



116 HANNAH MORE. 

the world, to be taught politeness at the expense of my plea= 
sure : however, his Letters came in my way, and by reading 
them, 1 have learned what I hope soon to forget ; namely, that 
laughter is a sure sign of ill-breeding, and that women have 
no genius. Very luckily, a full answer to his lordship's as- 
sertion was recommended to me ; I mean Miss H. More's 
poem, — Sir Eldred of the Bower ^ the real pleasure I received 
in reading that, and the Bleeding Rock, a legendary tale, by 
the same author, was to me so point blank against his lord- 
ship's doctrine, that I could not help showing my gratitude to 
the lady, and ray disapprobation of the lord, in the follow- 
ing lines :— 

" Far from the reach of mortal grief, 

Well, Stanhope, art thou fled ! 
Nor could' st thou, lord, now gain belief 

Tho' rising from the dead. 

Thy wit, di female champion braves, 

And blasts thy critic power, 
She comes — and in her hand she waves, 

* Sir Eldred of the Bower.' 

The victor's palm aloft she bears, 

And sullen foes submit, 
The laurel crown from man she tears, 

And routs each lordly wit. 

* A female work, if this should prove,' 

Cries out the beaten foe, 

* 'Tis Pallas, from the head of Jove, 

Complete from top to toe. 

* With feeling, elegance and force 

Unite their matchless power. 
And prove that from a heavenly source 
Springs " Eldred of the Bower. '^ ' 



HANNAH MORE. 117 

* True,' cries the god of verse, * 'tis mine, 

And now the farce is o'er, 
To vex proud man, I wrote each line, 

And gave them Hannah More !' " 

This, from Garrick, was no small praise, and he testified his 
friendship in another way, by writing the epilogue to the first 
dramatic piece of our authoress which was placed upon the stage, 
namely, " The Inflexible Captive." Dr. Langhorne wrote the 
prologue, and the play was performed at the Bath Theatre. 
In her next literary ejffort, she adopted prose ; and, in " Essays 
to Young Ladies," communicated most excellent advice and 
caution. In 1778, she produced the tradegy of " Percy," 
which was performed at Drury Lane Theatre ; Garrick ex- 
erting himself so much for the success of the piece, that one 
of the greatest actresses of the day, observed, " his nursing 
had enabled the bantling to go alone in a month ; while Cum- 
berland's tradegy of the ' Battle of Hastings,' which came 
out just after, for want of such fostership, died of the 
rickets I" 

The success of the play was complete. This encouraged 
the authoress to try again. She did so, under the friendly 
criticism of Garrick, and in 1779, the tradegy of " Fatal 
Falsehood," was brought out. Garrick did not live to wit- 
ness its reception : and from that time, Hannah More ceased 
to write for the stage ; and never afterwards, so it is said, 
attended a dramatic entertainment. 

Garrick's widow held Hannah More in the highest estima- 
tion. For a long time they continued to reside together, and 
Boswell, in his Life of Johnson, says, that Mrs. Garrick was 
accustomed to call Miss More her " domestic chaplain," and 
the doctor himself mentions her as the confidential friend of 



118 ' HANNAH MORE. 

Mrs. Garrick, for wkom she wrote and transacted business. 
Not long before his death Johnson appeared one evening at 
the club in Essex Street, in high spirits, and said, '* I dined 
yesterday at Mrs. Garrick's, with Miss Carter, Hannah More, 
and Fanny Burney. Three such women are not to be found. 
I know not where I could find a fourth, except Miss Lennox, 
who is superior to them all." 

An anecdote is related of Miss More having once said to 
the doctor, that she felt some surprise that the author of 
Paradise Lost should write such poor sonnets, to which John- 
son replied, *' Milton, madam, was a genius that could cut 
Colossus from rock, but he could not carve heads upon 
cherry stones." 

In 1782 appeared a volume of sacred dramas from the pen 
of Hannah More. This was recommendation enough. The 
book was dedicated to the Duchess of Beaufort, and contained 
"The Finding of Moses," "David and Goliath," " Belshaz- 
zar," and " Daniel." The work went through many editions, 
and was an universal favourite. Shortly after the publication 
of this volume, a copy of verses was shewn to Miss More, said 
to be written by a poor, illiterate woman. The verses 
breathed the very spirit of true poetry, and were rendered still 
more interesting by a certain natural and strong impression of 
misery which seemed to fill the mind and heart of the author. 
On making inquiries Hannah More found that the poor woman 
had been born and bred in her present humble occupation, 
that of selling milk. She had not received the least educa- 
tion, except that her brother had taught her to read and write. 
" Her mother," says Miss More, in a letter to Mrs. Montagu, 
" appears to have had sense and piety, and to have given an 
early tincture of religion to this poor woman's mind. She is 
about eight and twenty, was married very young to a man 



HANNAH MORE. 



119 



who is said to be honest and sober, but of a turn of mind very 
different from her own. Eepeated losses, and a numerous 
family (for they had six children in seven years) reduced them 
very low, and the rigours of the last severe winter sunk them 
to the extremity of distress. For your sake, dear madam, 
and for my own, I wish I could entirely pass over this part of 
the story ; but some of her most affecting verses would be 
unintelligible without it. Her aged mother, her six little 
infants and herself, were actually on the point of perishing, 
and had given up every hope of human assistance, when the 
gentleman, so gratefully mentioned in her poem to Stella, 
came to their relief. The poor woman and her children were 
preserved, but (imagine, dear madam, a scene which will not 
bear detail) for the unhappy mother all assistance came too 
late ; she had the joy to see it arrive, but it was a joy she was 
no longer able to bear, and it was more fatal to her than 
famine had been." The young woman had preserved a perfect 
simplicity in her manners. She had carefully studied our 
English poets, and though it was denied to her to " drink at 
the pure well-head of pagan poesy," yet, from the fountain 
of Divine wisdom her mind appeared to have been wonderfully 
nourished and enriched. Under the kind |care of Hannah 
More, this talented but unfortunate woman was comfortably 
settled in her native place. 

We have alluded to this episode in the life of Hannah More 
as an instance of her benevolent exertion for the amelioration 
of the condition of the wretched, and her keen appreciation of 
genius wherever it was found. In 1786 appeared two poems 
by our authoress — " Florio, a Tale for Fine Gentlemen and Fine 
Ladies," and " Bas Bleu, or Conversation : addressed to Mrs. 
Vesey." Her next publication was a poem on "The Slave 
Trade," then carried on with all its horrors by enlightened 



120 HANNAH MORE. 

christian Englishmen. That subject was then beginning to 
arrest public attention, and men were beginning to question 
whether *' God's image cut in ebony" was really justifiably 
held in bondage by '* the devil's image cut in ivory." The 
slave-dealer and the slave-holder were beginning to tremble : 
their " peculiar institution" was doomed to die. On the cruel 
and stupid argument that the negroes did not feel the infliction 
on them as the Europeans would, our fair authoress observes : — 

" "When the fierce sun darts vertical his beams, 
And thirst and hunger mix their wild extremes ; 
When the sharp iron wounds his inmost soul, 
And his slrain'd eyes in burning anguish roll : 
"Will the parch' d negro own, ere he expire, 
No pain in hunger, and no heat in fire ?" 

But Hannah More saw before her a goal starred and lumi- 
nous. She felt that Christ came to give liberty to the captive, 
in another besides a spiritual sense : she saw in the genius of 
Christianity a giant power that would burst the bonds of the 
slave ; she felt that no curse of God was on the race of Africa, 
but that the curse must descend on those who held their black 
brethren in bondage ; faith enough had she to see beyond the 
present, and her prediction she lived long enough to see 
fulfilled :— 

" And now her high commission from above, 
Stamp' d with the holy character of love, 
The meek-eyed spirit, waving in her hand, 
Breathed manumission o'er the rescued land. 

She tears the banner stain' d with blood and tears, 
And Liberty ! thy shining standard rears : 
As the bright ensign's glory she displays, 
See pale oppression faints beneath the blaze. 



HANNAH MORE. 121 

The giant dies ! no more his frown appals, 
The chain untouch'd, drops off; the fetter falls: 
Astonish' d echo tells the vocal shore — 
Oppression's fallen, and slavery is no more ! 

The dusky myriads crowd the sultry plain, 
And hail that mercy long invok'd in vain. 
Victori.ous power ! she bursts their twofold bands, 
And faith and freedom spring from Britain's hands." 

Would that freedom the wide world over reigned : would 
that slavery were dead in every land as well as Britain — that 
millions of slaves into men were new-born, and that no man- 
stealing iniquity disgraced the banner of the stars and stripes ! 

In 1778, Hannah More produced a moral tract, entitled 
"Thoughts on the Manners of the Great." Nobody could 
complain that the authoress thought unfairly. She judged 
impartially, and her thoughts on the manners of the great 
were thoughts that set the mental machinery in motion. 
Having now realized a competence, Miss 3Iore and her sisters 
gave up the school at Bristol, and settled in a romantic spot in 
Somersetshire, to which they gave the name of Cowslip Green. 
There in her own peaceful home Hannah More continued her 
literary occupations. In 1791 sh?published a small volume, 
entitled *' An Estimate of the Religion of the Fashianable 
World." She saw and she deplored the decline of vital 
Christianity. She saw that even they who professedly called 
themselves Christians denied their faith in practice, and 
betrayed their Master with a kiss. Religion was at that 
period attacked from without, and rent from within. Paine 
was hurling scurrilous impiety at what he neither felt nor 
understood : free-thinking was in vogue, and people were 
hailing the advent of an age of reason ; reason which went 
stark raving mad. France was the scene of anarchy and 



122 HANISTAH MORE. 

confusion. Revolutionary leaders had sworn to trample 
Christianity in the dust; they had doomed the faith, con- 
demned religion, and confounding it with fanaticism and 
superstition, had crucified it between two thieves ! And here 
in England, our countrymen were forgetting the faith for 
which heroes fought and martyrs bled. It was a fitting time 
for an appeal on behalf of religion ; and Hannah More made 
that appeal, and honour be to her for it. 

Then came her " Village Politics ;" an admirably written 
tract, in the form of a dialogue between two mechanics ; one 
a loyal and religious subject, and the other, a half proselyte to 
republicanism and infidelity. By plain and home arguments, 
level to the meanest capacity, the former succeeded in bring- 
ing his neighbour back to the way of truth and sobriety, and 
is the means of building him up in the faith which teaches us 
to fear God, and honour the king. Then came the " Cheap 
Repoisitory ; " a monthly publication for the people. It con- 
tained many well written tales ; among them, — " The Shep- 
herd of Salisbury Plain," " The Two Wealthy Farmers," 
*' The Two Shoemakers," " Betty Brown the Orange Girl," 
" Black Giles the Poacher," " Mr. Fantom the Infidel, and 
his Servant," " Hester Wilmot," and the "Allegories." 
Seven hundred thousands of this publication were sold. They 
could not be printed fast enough to supply the demand. 

" Strictures on the Modern System of Female Education, 
with a view of the principles and conduct prevalent among 
women of rank and fortune," was a capital work, meeting 
with the high approbation of the Bishop of London. It was 
originally published in 1799, in two volumes. One there was 
v*rho lifted his voice against it, and this was no other person 
than a venerable archdeacon. For him the book was too reli- 
gious. Doubtless the favourite text of the good archdeacon, 



HANNAH MORE. 



123 



was that mystical one out of the book of Ecclesiastes : — " Be 
not righteous over much." The clergyman published letters 
to Mrs. H. More, to counteract the obnoxious doctrines. 
Mrs. H. More did not reply; the flame of controversy waxed 
dim ; the proscribed treatise became a household word ; and 
the '' remonstrance " found its way to the trunk makers. 

Mrs. More took an active part in every benevolent exer- 
tion. She did not only sit on a chair and make verses ; she 
lent her valuable aid where she possessed any influence for 
good. Sunday schools were being projected, and she assisted 
in their formation. One was established in her own imme- 
diate neighbourhood. She saw the wretchedness and misery 
which pervaded the land ; she did what she could to better 
the condition of the adult population, but the rising generation 
especially elicited her sympathy. The young are the hope of 
the church, and the hope of the world ; for the youth of a 
nation are the trustees of posterity. 

A collection edition of Mrs. More's Works was brought out 
in 1801. Besides the general preface to this Collection, she 
gives a particular one to the volume containing her three tra- 
gedies ; her object being to explain her change of sentiment 
v.ith regard to the lawfulness of christian professors attending 
theatrical exhibitions. Passing over comedy as wholly inde- 
fensible, she confines her objections to tragedy, the acting of 
which, she represents as tending to produce impressions irre- 
concileable with the christian temper. Of course she applies 
this to the acting of plays, not to the closet reading of dra- 
matic works. 

In 1805 appeared " Hints towards forming the Character 
of a Young Princess." This book was dedicated to the 
Bishop of Exeter. Four years later came out a tale in two 
volumes — " Ccelebs in Search of a Wife." The object of the 



124 HANNAH MORE. 

work will appear from the opening, where the pious mother 
of Coelebs describes what sort of person a wife should be : — 
" I am so firmly persuaded, Charles," she would kindly say, 
" of the justice of your taste, and the rectitude of your prin- 
ciples, that I am not much afraid of your being misled by the 
captivating exterior of any woman who is greatly deficient 
either in sense or conduct ; but remember, my son, that there 
are many women, against whose character there may be nothing 
very objectionable, who are yet little calculated to taste or 
to communicate rational happiness. Do not indulge romantic 
ideas of superhuman excellence. Eemember that the' fairest 
creature is a fallen creature. Yet let not your standard be 
low. If it be absurd to expect perfection, it is not unreason- 
able to expect consistency. Do not suffer yourself to be 
caught by a shining quality, till you know it is not counter- 
acted by the opposite defect. Be not taken in by strictness 
at one point, till you are assured there is no laxity in others. 
In character, as in architecture, proportion is beauty. The 
education of the present race of females is not very favourable 
to domestic happiness. For my own part, I call education, 
not that which smothers a woman with accomplishments, but 
that which tends to consolidate a firm and regular system of 
character — that which tends to form a friend, a companion, 
a wife. I call education not that which is made up of the 
shreds and patches of useful arts, but that which inculcates 
principles, polishes tastes, regulates temper, cultivates reason, 
subdues the passions, directs the feelings, habituates to re- 
flection, trains to self-denial, and more especially that which 
refers all actions, feelings, sentiments, tastes, and passions, to 
the love and fear of God." 

The love and fear of God ruled the heart and life of Hannah 
More. In 1811 she wrote a book called '* Practical Piety," 



HANNAH MORE. 125 

but her life was a treatise on that important theme. She 
brought her religion practically to bear on every affair of 
common life ; her faith was no closet theology. In what we 
have said, it is evident that she was a voluminous writer. 
Her books followed one another in quick succession. They 
were always favourably received. When age and sickness 
secluded her from the world, she was not unmindful of the 
world's interests. Nothing damped her zeal ; nothing weak- 
ened her mental energy ; — not the weight of years ; not the 
loss of friends, nor long and painful suffering ; — she still 
laboured as in early life; and in 1815 published an essay 
on the " Character and Practical Writings of St. Paul." From 
this time to the end of her pilgrimage, there is little to arrest 
the attention. To the last she felt interested in all that belonged 
to man. 

Hannah More died on the 7th of September, 1833, aged 
eighty-eight. She had made about £30,000 by her writings, 
and she left by her will legacies to charitable institutions 
amounting to £10,000. The funeral, in conformity to her 
own wishes, was devoid of pomp and show. 



QUEExN ADELAIDE. 



The name of Queen Adelaide will ever be beloved. She 
commended herself to the esteem of all by her unaffected 
goodness. As Duchess of Clarence she began to exhibit 
excellent qualities of mind and heart ; as queen consort these 
qualities shone out more brightly, and when her husband 
passed away and another monarch occupied the throne, the 
Queen Dowager was still the admiration of the people. She 
lived in their love ; she died universally regretted, and her 
memory is embalmed in their affections. 

The Princess Adelaide was born on the 13th of August, 
1792. She was the eldest daughter of the Duke of Saxe 
Coburg Meiningen. It was a period of great political con- 
vulsion. Crowns were in the dust, thrones were overturned, 
ancient systems were giving way before the onward march of 
revolution. Those who wore the diadem had cause for fear. 
The bonnet row^e usurped the place of the white lily of St. 
Louis. All Germany was in an uproar. In 1803 the father 
of the Princess Adelaide expired. The princess was then 
but eleven years old. She was confided to the care of her 
mother, and her early life was passed partly in the ducal 
palace at Meiningen and partly at the Castle of Alstengtein. 
It is said that Queen Charlotte ever felt a deep interest in the 
welfare of the young princess, whose education was conducted 
with the greatest care, the affections as well as the intellect 
being trained by judicious teachers ; teaching which fitted her 
for the high station she was afterwards called to occupy. 




•-^" 

# 




]L ATE 



QUEEN ADELAIDE. 127 

The circumstances which led to her union with the Duke 
of Clarence are simply told. The nation looked with love 
and interest upon the daughter of the unfortunate Caroline, 
the Princess Charlotte. The people saw in her their future 
queen. But their expectations were disappointed ; she 
married, but in giving birth to a child perished, and mother 
and child slept together in the tomb. Who was to be heir 
to the crown ? The Prince Regent was now childless ; the 
royal dukes were in a similar position. But the Dukes of 
Kent and Clarence were still unmarried. Matrimonial 
alliances were immediately formed. With regard to the 
Duke of Kent, his affections were already engaged, and of 
this we have spoken before, but Clarence was still unengaged. 
There is indeed a melancholy story about Mrs. Jordan, which 
we shall not here relate. 

The Duke of Clarence was a popular favourite. He entered 
the navy in the twelfth year of his age, under the care of 
Eear-Admiral Digby, a brave and distinguished officer, and 
was actively engaged during the whole course of the war. 
He was distinguished for his bravery, his fidelity, his humanity. 
He afterwards held the rank of Lord High Admiral, which since 
the death of Prince George of Denmark, husband of Queen 
Anne, had been held on commission. During the period 
which he filled this office, he visited every naval depot, freely 
conversed with every officer and commander, based every 
promotion on pure merit and actual service, and thus endeared 
himself to the whole British navy. 

Between this noble-hearted prince and Adelaide of Saxe 
Coburg a matrimonial alliance was formed. Pictures were 
exchanged and letters written, but not such letters as Henry 
VIII. has left behind him for the teaching of all royal lovers ; 
they were cool, solemn, sedate, for the matter was political. 



128 QUEEN ADELAIDE. 

The Duke of Clarence was fifty-three, the Princess Adelaide 
but twenty-six. On the 4th of July, 1818, she arrived in 
England, and took up her abode at Grillon's Hotel. The 
intelligence was immediately conveyed to the Duke, v;ho 
although it was ten o'clock at night, waited upon her to pay 
his respects, and welcome her on her safe arrival in England. 

On the ]Oth of the same month she was presented to 
Queen Charlotte, who gave the young princess a very gracious 
reception. On the 18th she was married, and at the same 
time the marriage of the Duke of Kent was re-solemnized, as 
the ceremony had been previously performed abroad. During 
the years which intervened between this event and the accession 
of the Duke of Clarence to the crown, Adelaide continued to 
exhibit rare excellence and virtue. Surrounded by the pomp 
and vanity of the world, she did not forget to estimate these 
things at their right value ; surrounded by temptation and 
allurement, she remained constant to her own right principles ; 
her character had been formed before she arrived in England, 
and nothing ever changed it. 

In 1830 George IV. died, and the Duke of Clarence was 
proclaimed king under the title of William IV., and Adelaide 
became queen. They were crowned at Westminster, but 
without the usual pomp and splendour. The love which the 
people had for the Duchess of Clarence deepened and strength- 
ened when the duchess became queen ; and she, instead of 
withdrawing from her benevolent exertions or lessening in her 
zeal for the public good, redoubled all her energies, and was 
still the same active, earnest woman, that she had ever been. 

In 1837 the wife became a widow. Her grief was very 
great and unaffected. It is not always we find tenderness 
and sympathy, and love and kindness, in palaces. Sometimes 
sceptres sweep away all tender emotion, and the man or the 



QUEEN ADELAIDE. 129 

woman are forgotten in the monarch, but it was not so with 
William or with Adelaide, it is not so with our beloved queen ; 
let us hope that those things have passed away with the " good 
old times," and have been buried in the tomb of all abuses. 

The joy of the nation at the accession of Victoria was 
chastened and subdued by the loss of the king. Adelaide felt 
it deeply, nat because she lost the diadem, but because she 
was a widow. Her remaining days were spent in doing good. 
She dispensed her charities with no niggard hand. Letters 
of those who were in great necessity were read to her and 
brought relief; the indigent who appealed to her never 
appealed in vain. Her private charities far exceeded her 
public gifts. She did not let her right hand know what her 
left hand did. She was no ostentatious giver. Yet this 
never prevented her rendering help when help was needed, to 
public institutions. She was a liberal contributor to the 
Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts ; 
a kind patron to that noble institution, The Sons of the Clergy. 
She gave freely to the churches in Nova Scotia and New- 
foundland : to the Christian Knowledge Society, to the Church 
Missionary Society, to the Eagged Schools, and to the Emi- 
gration Funds. A great number of other societies' found in 
her a liberal friend. The cathedral at Adelaide was chiefly 
built at her expense. 

Her health was bad, and she travelled much for the benefit 
of change of air. She visited the islands of Madeira and 
Malta, and the church of Valetta was founded by her ; but 
wherever she went she preserved the strictest privacy, and 
was known not as the Queen Dowager, but as the Duchess of 
Lancaster. 

Queen Adelaide died on the 2nd of December, 1849. 



lES. S. C. HALL, 



Fielding is a name well known to English readers. There 
are certain popular novels that, taking their interest from no 
adventitious circumstances, are the novels for all time, which 
one cannot readily forget, and it may be interesting to know 
that the maiden name of Mrs. S. C. Hall was Fielding ; not, 
however, that we intend to intimate thereby that this illustrious 
lady is descended from her still more illustrious namesake ; 
but there is something in the coincidence. 

Mrs. Hall is a favourite, and unlike some favourites we 
could mention, really deserves the place she holds in public 
estimation. Her family originally came from Switzerland, 
and settled in Ireland long ago. Mrs. Hall is a native of 
Wexford. But while she was yet in her teens she quitted 
Ireland, and settled with her mother in England. Happy 
thing for her that such was the case. She remained long 
enough in Ireland to have its scenery, its leading characteris- 
ticSj the honest kindness of the people, the mirth and misery, 
the dancing and distress, the singing and sighing, vividly 
impressed upon her ; long enough to see its desolation and 
its danger, its happiness and hope ; not long enough to learn 
enmity to the Saxon, and by the resuscitation of old wrongs to 
awaken the spirit of vengeance. Her books are what Charles 
Lamb called " healthy books ;" exhibiting a faithful picture of 
Ireland and the Irish, they are free from all party bias, 
Mrs. Hall looks at things as they are, never permits her 
predilections to distort facts, nor her passions to get the better 



MRS. S. C. HALL. IBl 

of her reason, and all her books are written in that calm, just, 
honest spirit that recommends itself to all impartial readers. 

Mrs. Hall's first work appeared in 1829, and was entitled, 
*' Sketches of Irish Character." These stories are far different 
from those of most Irish novelists : there is not much of wild 
romance — there is not a constant succession of blunders, 
understood to- be Irishisms — there is the same quaint and 
beautifully-descriptive powers of the human heart and of 
natural scenery, which so eminently distinguish the writings 
of Miss Mitford. Mrs. Hall did not imagine Irish society, 
and write her imaginations in a rose-coloured boudoir ; she 
found her models and her subjects in the world astir, and the 
rich vein of humour which glistens here and there like fine 
Australian gold, and breaks out sometimes into a perfect 
nugget of wit, is the genuine article, and not mere tinsel- work 
that looks like it. Her descriptions of rural scenery are 
delightful. She is an ardent admirer of nature. The French 
painters of the last century severely criticised this world of 
ours, its forests, hills, and vales. Boucher complained that 
nature wanted harmony, and Lancret that it was too green. 
Now-a-days, there are painters and writers who hold thes'^ 
doctrires in their hearts, though they dare not avow them ; 
and on their page and on their canvass they represent not 
nature as it is, but a sort of improved nature, touched up 
with artificiality. Mrs. Hall is not of this class. 

In 1830 our authoress issued a little volume for children, 
consisting of a series of tales, simple, natural, and easy, full of 
home-truths and moral remarks. They were called " Chroni- 
cles of a School-room," and are admirably adapted for the 
purpose she had in view. A second series of "Irish Sketches" 
appeared in 1831. These were as favourably received as the 
first ; and this is saying much. A second series sometimes 



132 MRS. S. C. HALL. 

turns out a failure, for when a writer begins to repeat herself 
or himselfj and to manufacture corresponding stories after an 
antecedent model, the repetition cramps and utterly destroys 
that freshness and vigour which recommended the first work. 
But this second series abounded with excellences, reflecting 
credit on the heart and judgment of the writer. The " Rap- 
paree" is perhaps the best of the whole : it is thoroughly good. 
Her next work was one of higher aim. It was a historical 
romance, ^of the legitimate length — three volumes. This was 
entitled the " Buccaneer." A historical romance is the 
loftiest description of prose fiction : it is by no means an easy 
matter to transfer our thoughts and feelings to another epoch, 
to cast ourselves into the fashion of another age, to delineate 
successfully the great men of the past, and placing them in 
new and surprising circumstances, preserve the identity of 
their characters, and make them think and feel, and speak and 
act as under those circumstances they would have done. All 
this is very difficult ; and yet our Circulating Libraries 
abound with this description of fiction. The days of Henry 
VIII., and his daughter Elizabeth, the civil wars of Charles's 
time, the Young Pretender, the French Revolution, and the 
rest of it, have given occasion to a very host of historical fic- 
tions. The great mass of them materially injure the true 
study of history ; it were impossible to doubt it. They mis- 
represent facts ; crowd in events that never occurred ; make 
mitred prelates and stern warriors talk the most silly sen ti- 
mentalisra, and destroy that reverence for truth which should 
be most carefully fostered. This is not the case with all — 
there are great and glorious exceptions ; and Mrs. Hall's 
romance is of this number. The tale is laid in England at 
the time of the Protectorate, and Oliver himself is among the 
characters. 



MRS. S. C. HALL. 133 

About the year 1834 came out the ''Tales of Woman's 
Trials," and in 1835, a novel, entitled '* Uncle Horace." A 
series of papers, under the title of " Lights and Shadows of 
Irish Life," had been contributed to the New Monthly Maga- 
zine, and were in 1838 collected and published in three 
volumes. They enjoyed a good share of popularity, and 
" The Groves of Blarney," one of the narratives, was played on 
the stage with considerable effect. 

In 1840 Mrs. Hall issued another novel, more popular than 
the Buccaneer, more interesting than Uncle Horace, and, 
perhaps, the best of her fictions — " Marian ; or a Young 
Maid's Fortune." It is justly celebrated for its skilful 
portraiture and delicate description. Katty Macane, an Irish 
servant, watches over the foundling Marian with all a mother's 
care. We give a specimen : — 

''I'll be a governess," said Marian, triumphantly ; "great 
women have been teachers, I have heard Miss Kitty say — 
great and good women. Kings must have teachers ; queens 
must have governesses." 

Katty Macane compressed her lips, and elevated her brows. 
" To go a-governessing is looking at the world through the 
back windows. I never heard such folly ! To be, as a body 
may say, between hawk and buzzard ; too low for the drawing- 
room, too high for the kitchen ; belonging neither to the earth 
beneath nor the heavens above ; slighted by the mistress ; 
insulted by the servants ; winked at by the gentlemen visitors, 
and shook off by the lady ones ; blamed for the faults of the 
children ; barked at by the dogs, scratched by the cats ; a 
thing without a place ; a free woman, treated as a born slave. 
Listen to me, avourneen. I have known at home and abroad, 
big and little, thirteen governesses in my time ; twelve were 
born miserable, and were always kept so ; the thirteenth was 



134 MRS. S. C. HALL. 

lucky, for she died in her first 'place. Och, alanna ! God 
break bard fortune before any woman's child — I'd raytber, or 
as soon, see you in yer grave, as going a-governessing." 

" Better tban living a dependent," said Marian, still more 
proudly ; " anything better than that." 

" Now listen to me. Ye're too young yet to dream of such 
a thing, for if ye war a rock o' sense, and a tree o' wisdom, 
which I never knew gentle or simple to be at your age, my 
precious darling, stately as ye're looking — setting a case 
you war all I say, did you ever know a governess, who, if she 
worked the brain out of her head, let alone her fingers to the 
bone, wasn't considered a dependent?" 

" She earns her income," persisted Marian ; " she gives 
her talents for her employer's money; one could not do 
without the other." 

"Och, good-morrow to ye, my lady;" exclaimed Katty, 
with the bitterness of a woman who knows the world ; " ye've 
read that in some romance. Look in the newspapers — though, 
indeed, it's better ye didn't. I, that have been a camp fol- 
lower for many a year — sarved under the duke (God keep 
him in health, and strength, and happiness, and glory, which 
he can't fail to be in, to the end of his days, and longer, seeing 
he's taken the shine out of Bonyparte and Marlboro', whose 
line place is close to where the big boys goes to school — 
Oxford they call it) — well, I never looks at a paper on account 
of the wakeness in my eyes, and the pot-boy not lending me 
the loan of one, barrin' on Sundays, on account of the small 
drop of beer I take ; and then I see so much badness in it, 
that I'm glad it's a Sunday I see it, for it can't be so bad 
that day as any other ; and, indeed, there's nothing in a paper 
much worse than advertisements for teachers, where they are 
expected to be the most edieated and wonderful of God's 



MRS. S. C. HALL. 135 

crayturs — with every quality of angels — French and Latin, 
and algebra, and music, and to have the charge of only five or 
six children, and needle-work, and hard-work, and wardrobe 
work, and nobody knows what — and then, at the heel of the 
hunt comes in, that^ as ifs a comfortable situation, no salary 
the first 7/ ear.'' 

Marian laughed at her nurse's picture ; but she had built 
her own castle, and resolved, poor girl, to inhabit it the first 
opportunity. 

To Chambers's Edinburgh Journal Mrs. Hall contributed a 
series of " Stories of the Irish Peasantry," which were after- 
wards published in a collected form ; but her great work is 
that which she undertook in conjunction with her husband, 
*' Ireland, its Scenery, Character," &c. This book, embel- 
lished by some of the first artists, is deservedly popular, and 
may be ranked among our standard works. 



MAET, QUEEN OF SCOTS. 



Mary, Queen of Scots, was the daughter of James V., king" 
of Scotland. At eight days old, on the death of her father 
she became heiress to the throne, and while yet an infant, was 
unconsciously the cause of a war with England ; the regency 
having refused the political offer of Henry VIII. to unite 
both kingdoms by the marriage of his son Edward to the 
Scottish queen. At six years of age she was affianced to the 
dauphin of France, and resided at Paris till the marriage was 
solemnized in 1548. Educated in France, she excelled in 
the freedom of her address, the politeness of her manners, 
and the play of her genius. She embodied the very perfection 
of elegance and refinement. She was skilled in various 
languages, ancient and modern, and proficient in several of the 
fine arts. She had been crowned at the age of nine months 
by Cardinal Beatoun, archbishop of St. Andrew's, and was 
immediately afterwards shut up in Stirling Castle by her 
mother, but as this fortress was not considered safe enough, 
she was conveyed to an island in the middle of Lake Monteith, 
where was a monastery, the only habitation in the place, with 
four other little girls, Mary Livingstone, Mary Fleming, Mary 
Seaton, and Mary Beatoun, who, as they never quitted her 
either in good or bad fortune, were called the four Maries of 
the queen. 

On her voyage to France, the vessel in which she was con- 
veyed was closely pressed by an English cruiser, and the 
young queen rarely escaped captivity. Besides the four 






MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS. 137 

Maries of the queen, the vessel also carried to France three 
of her natural brothers, among whom was James Stuart, Prior 
of Saint Andrew's, who, at a later period, abjured the Catholic 
religion, and, with the title of regent of the kingdom, and 
under the name of the Earl of Murray, became so fatal to ,,^ <aM- 
poor Mary. From Brest, Mary went to Saint Germain en Laye, . 7^ C .', 
where Henry 11., who had just mounted the throne, almost 
smothered her with caresses, and then sent her to a convent 
, where the heiresses of the noblest houses of France received 
their education. The good qualities of Mary were fully 
developed there. Born with the heart of a woman and the 
head of a man, Mary not only acquired all those accomplish- 
ments which form the education of a future queen, but even a 
knowledge of the exact sciences which complete the studies of 
a clever doctor. Consequently, at the age of fourteen, she 
pronounced, in a chamber at the Louvre, before Henry II., 
Catherine de Medici, and the whole court, a Latin discourse of 
her own composition, in which she maintained that it was 
most becoming for woman to cultivate learning, and that it 
was unjust and tyrannical to deprive flowers of their perfume, 
by confining young girls merely to the care of their households. 
It will easily be understood in what way a future queen, 
maintaining such a thesis, was received in a court which was 
the most learned and the most pedantic of the whole of 
Europe, Placed between the literature of Kabelais and 
Marot, which was near its decline, and that of Eonsard and 
Montaigne, who were approaching the height of their glory, 
Mary became the Queen of Poetry, and too happy would she 
have been never to have worn any other crown but that which 
Ronsard, De Bellay, Maison-Fleur, and Brantorae daily placed 
upon her brow. In the midst of these fetes which dying 
chivalry was attempting to resuscitate, the fatal joust of th& 

N 2 



138 MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

Tournelles arrived. Henry II., struck in the face by the 
splinter of a lance, was gathered to his forefathers before his 
time, and Mary Stuart mounted the throne of France, where 
the mourning she put on for Henry was renewed for her 
mother, and the mourning she wore for her mother continued 
for her husband. 

In melting strains she deplored her loss, strains which still 
vibrate in the chords of the human heart : — 

" Did cruel destiny e'er shed 
Such ruin on a wretched head ? 
Did e'er once happy woman know 
So sad a scene of heartfelt woe ? 
For, ah, behold on yonder bier 
All that my heart and eyes held dear. 

The sweet delights of happier days 
New anguish in my bosom raise ; 
Of shining day the purest light 
To me is drear and gloomy night ; 
Nor is there aught so good and fair 
As now to claim my slightest care. 

If to the heavens, in rapt'rous trance, 
I haply throw a wistful glance, 
His visionary form I see 
Pictur'd in orient clouds to me. 
Sudden it flies, and he appears 
Drown'd in a watery tomb of tears. 

Awhile, if balmy slumbers spread 
Their downy pinions o'er my head, 
I touch his hand in shadowy dreams, 
His voice to soothe my fancy seems. 
When wak'd by toil, or lull'd by rest, 
His image ever fills my breast. 



MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS. 139 

But cease my song ; cease to complain, 
And close the sadly plaintive strain, 
To which no artificial tears 
But love unfeign'd the burden bears ; 
Nor can my sorrow e'er decrease, 
For, ah, his absence ne'er can csase." 

Yet the Queen of Scots had but small time for poetising. 
Her direful dirge had to give place to dreary duty. One of 
her contemporaries says : — *' It was then that it did one good 
to behold her, for the whiteness of her face vied with the 
^whiteness of her veil ; hut in the end the art of her veil gave 
way before the complexion of her lovely face, which was as 
white as drifted snow. For, from the moment she hecarae a 
widow, she was always extremely pale, whenever I had the 
honour of seeing her, either in France or Scotland, where, at 
the end of eighteen months after her widowhood, she was, to 
her very great regret, obliged to go, in order to pacify her 
kingdom, which was much divided by religious troubles. 
Alas ! she desired not to go. And I have often heard her say, 
that she dreaded the journey as much as death, for she would 
have preferred a hundred times remaining in France as dowa- 
ger only, with Touraine and Porton for her dower, to going to 
reign in her wild country ; but her uncles, some of them at 
least, not all, advised and pressed her to go ; but they after- 
wards greatly repented of the fault they had committed in 
thus advising her." 

Affairs were at a crisis in Scotland. The work of reforma- 
tion was fast proceeding. John Knox was no longer a slave 
on the river Loire. Romish teachings were giving way, 
though the genius of true toleration was unknown, and the 
unhappy kingdom was rent by contending factions. The 
land was troubled, religion was troubled, the people were 



140 MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

troubled ; but like the waters of Bethesda, there was healing 
in the troubling. 

Mary quitted France with a heavy heart. Clothed in deep 
mourning she stood in the forecastle of the vessel, and while 
the tears ran down her cheeks, murmured — "Adieu, France, 
adieu. I shall never see thee more!" Mary had but one 
hope left, which was, that the appearance of an English fleet 
would force her little squadron to return to France ; but her 
destiny was fixed. A fog, which was a most extraordinary 
thing in summer, spread itself that day across the whole of 
the Channel, and hid the galleys from the English cruisers • 
for this fog was so thick that it was impossible to see even 
from the stern of the ship to the mast. It lasted all through 
" Sunday, which was the day following her departure, and only 
cleared oiF at eight o'clock on Monday morning. The little 
fleet, which had, during all that time, been guided by hazard, 
found itself surrounded by such a quantity of rocks, that, if 
the fog had continued a few minutes longer, the galley would 
have certainly struck on some reef or other, and would have 
perished, like the vessel which they had seen go down, when 
they left the harbour. Thanks to this clearing away of the 
haze, the pilot recognized the coast of Scotland, and skilfully 
steering his four vessels through the shoals, brought them to 
an anchor on the 20th of August, at Leith, where nothing had 
been prepared to receive the queen. She was scarcely arrived, 
however, when the principal personages of the town assembled, 
and came to offer her their congratulations. In the meantime, 
a few wretched ponies were hastily procured, whose harness 
was falling to pieces, to take the queen to Edinburgh. On 
seeing them Mary could not refrain from again weeping, for 
she thought of the magnificent palfreys and richly-caparisoned 
steeds of her French squires and ladies ; thus, from the very 









MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS. 141 

first, Scotland appeared to her in all its misery, and the next 
day, she was to see it in all its ferocity. 

From that moment her history partakes of the character of 
a tragedy. 

Protestantism was in the ascendant, — protestantism that M^ i^tfril^hmi 
had bled and groaned for its protest, but that had not learned 
toleration from intolerance. The queen sought to gain the 
affections of her people by bestowing upon the protestant -^ - - ' "} ' 
leaders high offices of state. She allowed them to worship (OiMil'iu^ 

God according to their conscience ; but, by a strange inconsis- 
tency, they denied the same favour to her. Having ordered 
mass to be performed in her own chapel, the popular indigna- 
tion arose to such a height, that but for the interposition of 
her natural brother, the prior of St. Andrew's, and a few 
others, the officiating priest would have been put to death on 
the spot, and the life of Mary seriously endangered. With 
rare magnanimity the queen not only suffered this act of 
violence to pass unpunished, but issued two successive pro- 
clamations, to the effect that any attempt to alter or subvert 
the protestant religion, as the religion of the nation, without 
the sanction of the legislature, should be considered a capital 
offence. 

But affairs were everyday becoming more difficult and 
more complicated. On her natural brother Mary conferred 
the title of Earl of Mar. This earldom had frequently been 
bestowed on some member of the royal family, but it awakened 
the jealousy of the nobles. It was the apple of discord. A 
rebellion shortly afterwards broke out, headed by the Earl of 
Huntley, who hated the ruling government, and was deter- 
mined to disturb its peace. He at first feigned submission, 
but having drawn together a sufficient army, advanced towards 
Aberdeen in hostile array. Mar, who had now exchanged the 



142 MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

title for that of Murray, resolved to give him battle, and the 
fight began near Corrichie. The victory was decisive for the 
queen. Huntley was trodden to death ; his son was beheaded 
at Aberdeen ; Murray took possession of the estates belonging 
to his new earldom, and Mary entered Edinburgh in the 
midst of general enthusiasm; an enthusiasm which was so 
great, that the people expressed both by voice and written 
application, that their queen, who had no children by Francis 
II., might marry again. 

Two years had been passed by the queen in widowhood. 
She was the next heir to the English throne ; Elizabeth had 
declared her intention of never marrying, the Queen of Scots 
was therefore encouraged to enter into a second matrimonial 
engagement. But it was deemed politic to consult Elizabeth. 
. Unfortunately this circumspection had not been always attended 
to, for on the death of the first Mary, she had claimed the 
throne of England, and, insisting on the illegitimacy of Eliza- 
beth's birth, had taken the title of Queen of Scotland, England, 
and Ireland, and had had money stamped with this title, and 
her plate engraved with her newly-assumed arms. Of course 
this was not calculated to inspire any great love in the heart 
of Elizabeth for Mary of Scotland, and it is said, that when 
Melville, the ambassador, arrived about the matrimonial en- 
gagement, that Elizabeth cast every obstacle in his way. 
Courtly gossip also tells us that the beauty of Mary was a 
great cause of jealousy and uneasiness to Elizabeth, who, as 
she had never seen her, could only judge by hearsay of what 
she really was. 

But while these things were going on at the English court, 
there were strange and tragic things occurring in Scotland. 

There was a young man named Chatelard, a poet and a 
soldier, he had loved the queen ere she quitted France, and, 



MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS, 143 

if report speak true, the queen loved him. When she left the 
shores of France, he left them too ; but his presence became 
dangerous ; his pretensions threatened to involve the queen in 
difficulties ; his own temerity brought on his ruin, and on a 
charge of high treason he was tried, condemned and executed. 
His scaffold was erected before the palace, and as he looked 
for the last time at the abode of his royal mistress, he uttered 
the words : — 

" Adieu, loveliest and most cruel princess of the world." 

Mary deeply felt his death, and mourned, as she had loved, 
in secret. 

Meantime it was reported that the queen had consented to 
marry again. Several suitors, belonging to the most princely 
houses of Europe, came forward. First was seen the Arch- 
duke Charles, third son of the emperor of Germany ; then 
followed the hereditary prince of Spain, Don Carlos, the same 
who was put to death by his father ; and after him came the 
Duke of Anjou, who subsequently became Henry III. ; but, 
by marrying a foreign prince, Mary would lose her right to 
the crown of England. She therefore refused them all ; and 
thinking this refusal would do her honour in the eyes of 
Elizabeth, she let fall her choice on a relation of the latter, 
named Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley, son of the Earl of Lennox. 

At first Elizabeth feigned to be satisfied, and suffered both 
Lennox and his son to visit the court of Scotland, but no 
sooner were the preliminaries of the marriage settled than she 
exclaimed against it ; ordered Darnley to return to England, 
seized his estates, and committed some of the members of his 
family to prison. Darnley sought Mary, the beautiful Mary, 
and he sought the crown of Scotland ; but being a weak- 
minded man, with but little purpose or energy of character, he 
employed an Italian, of humble birth, named Rizzio, to carry 



144 MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

on his suit, and make interest for him with the lovely queen. 
This man managed successfully. Never were men so intimate 
as Darnley and Eizzio. At length, on the 29th of July, 1565, 
Mary was married to Darnley, at Edinbtirgh. But the Scotch 
nobility were ill satisfied with the arrangement; protestants 
feared evil results from the union, and the whole nation looked 
upon it with distrust. And as for the queen, the marriage to 
her proved most unhappy. Darnley doubted the fidelity of 
Rizzio, he imagined that this man had alienated the affections 
of Mary. He was deeply mortified, and longed for revenge. 
He had not gained what he expected to gain — the crown 
matrimonial. He was the husband of the queen, not king of 
Scotland ; Mary reigned, not Mary and Darnley. With a few 
of the nobles he concerted a plan for the destruction of Rizzio. 
His first idea was to give him a mock trial, and have him 
hanged ; but this death he considered too lenient. He wanted 
to punish the queen by slaying Rizzio in her presence. 

On Saturday, March 9th, 1556, Mary had invited six 
persons to sup with her, and among the rest, Rizzio. 
Darnley, who had been informed of this, sent word to the 
conspirators bidding them be at one of the palace doors, 
between six and seven that evening. A French writer describes 
what ensued : — 

" At the hour appointed, the conspirators, who had been 
informed during the day of the pass-word, knocked at the 
gates of the castle, which were opened by Darnley himself, 
who, enveloped in a large cloak, was waiting for them at the 
postern. The hundred and fifty soldiers entered the inner 
yard, and drew up under the galleries, both to protect them- 
selves from the cold and to escape being seen on the snow, 
with which the ground was covered. A window, whence 
issued a glare of light, looked out on the yard ; it was that 



MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS. 145 

of the queen's closet. At the first signal given from this 
window, the soldiers were to break open the door and hasten 
to the assistance of th€ leaders of the conspiracy. 

All orders having been given, Darnley led Morton, Ruthven, 
Lennox, and Douglas's bastard, into a chamber adjoining the 
closet, from which it was only separated by some tapestry 
hanging across the door. Everything which was said could 
be heard from that place, whence those stationed there could 
be, at one single spring, in the midst of the queen's guests. 

Darnley left them in this chamber, enjoining them to be 
silent ; and having told them they were to enter the queen's 
closet, when they heard him cry out some words they had 
agreed on, he went round by the secret passages, so that the 
queen, on seeing him enter by the customary door, might not 
feel surprised at his unexpected visit. 

Mary was at table with six persons, having, say de Thou 
and Melvill, Rizzio on her right, while Camden, on the con- 
trary, says that he was supping at a side-board and was not 
seated. The conversation was gay and unrestrained. All at 
once, Mary, astonished at seeing the profoundest silence suc- 
ceed the lively and varied talk which had been kept up since 
the beginning of supper, and suspecting, from the looks of her 
guests, that the cause of her uneasiness was behind her, turned 
round, and perceived Darnley leaving over her chair. The 
queen shuddered ; for though a smile was on her husband's 
lips, that smile had taken, as he looked at Rizzio, so strange 
an expression, that it was evident that something terrible was 
about to happen. At the same moment, Mary heard a heavy 
foot-fall in the next chamber, then the curtains were raised, 
and Lord Ruthven, as pale as death, appeared on the threshold 
of the door, an4 silently drawing his sword, leaned his arms 
upon it. The queen thought that he was mad. 



146 MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

*' What do you do there, my lord ?" asked she ; " and why 
do you come thus armed to the palace?" "Ask the king, 
madam," replied Ruthven, in a hollow voice : " he will answer 
you." "Explain the meaning of this, my lord," said Mary, 
turning towards Darnley ; " What signifies this strange in- 
trusion ?" "It signifies, madam," answered Darnley, point- 
ing at Rizzio, " that that man must immediately leave this 
place." "That man is in my service, my lord,'* said Mary, 
proudly rising, "and, in consequence, obeys none but me." 

"Help!" cried Darnley. 

On hearing this, the conspirators, who, fearing that Darn- 
ley, with his changeable character, had brought them there for 
nothing, and that he did not now dare give the signal, had al- 
ready drawn near Ruthven, rushed into the chamber with such 
force that they upset the table. Then David Rizzio, seeing 
that it was he they sought, threw himself on his knees behind 
the queen, and clinging to her dress, exclaimed in Italian 
" Giustizia ! giustizia !" The queen, faithful to her character* 
and unawed by so terrible a visit, placed herself before Rizzio, 
who sheltered himself beneath her majesty. But she relied too 
much on the respect of those nobles who, for five centuries, 
had been accustomed to struggle, man to man, with their 
kings. One of the assassins put a dagger to her breast, and 
threatened to kill her, if she further attempted to defend the 
life of him on whose death they were resolved. Then Darnley, 
without any respect for the queen, seized her round the waist, 
and dragged her forcibly away from Rizzio, who remained on 
his knees, pale and trembling, while Douglas unsheathing his 
poniard, plunged it into the bosom of the minister, who fell 
back wounded, but not dead. Morton immediately took him 
up by the heels, and dragged him out of the closet, leaving on 
ihe floor a long trace of blood, which is still visible ; when in 



MARY, QUEEN" OF SCOTS. 147 

the outer chamber, they all rushed, like hungry hounds, upon 
the body, which was stabbed in fifty-six places. 

Not long after this event Mary gave birth to a son and heir. 
A messenger was despatched to inform the queen of England 
of the circumstance, but dark days were gathering around Mary. 
Deeper tumult came instead of quiet. The prince was chris- 
tened amid the -most splendid and imposing solemnities, but the 
voice of discord was still heard. The Earl of Bothwell began 
to distinguish himself. He it was who had hastened to the 
queen's assistance when Eizzio was murdered, and since that 
day he had gradually risen in favour, until he set at nought 
the authority of Darnley. Suspicions were afloat about the 
innocence of the queen. " But guilty she was not. Tradition 
must yield to the inflexibility of facts." There is a text 
which is often quoted in support of capital punishment, which 
in the sense of a prediction, is being perpetually realized. *' He 
that sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed.' 
Darnley had murdered Rizzio, and in his turn Darnley was 
murdered. A conspiracy was formed against him. Circum- 
stances favoured the conspiracy. He was seized with the small- 
pox at Glasgow, whither he had for a time retired. He was 
lodged on his return, in a religious house called, Kirk-of-field, 
just within the walls of Edinburgh. One night a terrible de- 
tonation rent the air ; the building was blown into countless 
pieces, and the country was momentarily illuminated for a 
quarter of a mile round ; then all returned to darkness, and 
the silence that prevailed was interrupted by the falling of the 
stones and timbers. Next day Darnley's body v/as found in a 
neighbouring garden ; it had been protected from the fire by 
the mattrasses on which it was lying. 

The voice of indignation was aroused. Bothwell was accused. 
The queen did not escape suspicion. Proclamation was made 



148 MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

that the queen would give two thousand pounds for such infor- 
mation as should lead to the discovery of the murderers, and 
on the next day the following placard was posted up under the 
proclamation : — 

" As it has been announced that those who would bring to 
light the murderers of Lord Darnley, should be rewarded with 
the sum of two thousand pounds, I, who have made a close 
inquiry, affirm that the perpetrators of the crime are the Earl 
of Bothwell, James Balfour, John Spence, David Chambers, 
and the queen herself." 

The Earl of Lennox publicly accused Bothwell, who was ac- 
cordingly brought to trial, but he came more like a king than^ 
a criminal. He was acquitted. 

On the day after the trial, Bothwell had the following chai- 
1 enge posted up about the town : — 

" Though I am sufficiently exonerated from Lord Darnley 's 
murder, of which I have been unjustly accused, yet the better 
to prove my innocence, I am ready to engage in combat with 
any one who dare to say that it was I who killed the king.'* 

An answer was posted up next day : — 

" I accept your challenge, provided you choose a neutral 
place." 

And so the matter dropped. 

Not long afterwards Mary was united to Bothwell For 
this purpose he divorced his own wife. Bitterly Mary regret- 
ted the union. Her illusion did not last long. She loved 
the man, and love is proverbially blind ; but her eyes- were 
opened, and she saw in him a master, gross, brutal, and violent. 
His conduct at length became such, that Mary, one day 
seized a knife, saying that she preferred to die to leading such 
a miserable life as hers. It was a miserable life, but in spite of 
continual ill-treatment, Mary was the first to make advances,. 



1 

MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS. 149 

and would become to Bothwell as gentle and obedient as a 

child. This could not last. Bothwell might govern Queen 

Mary, but he could not govern Scotland. An insurrection 

broke out. Mary and Bothwell were nearly taken prisoners. ^^jQjg^i?^*****!^^ 

The confederate nobles were determined to put an end to the • - 

arbitrary reign of Bothwell ; there was disaffection in the army, 

and at length Mary herself consented to join the confederates. ^J^'^'/ '^""■^ 

Bothwell fled. The queen w^as conveyed to the castle of Loch- ^Ad, ^■'M^-^c^ 

leven and there detained a prisoner. Bothwell was pursued, S'V.;|i.i3isC4^ 

captured, thrown into a dungeon, where he miserably perished, ^ -. i-^u.^ 

while Mary was compelled to surrender her crown in favour of 

her infant son. A recent writer says : — 

The marriage cf Mary with Bothwell, was not, any more 
than that with Darnley, the fruit of love, but sprang rather from 
the ambition of the profligate noble, goaded on by those who 
were secretly hostile to the reign of her majesty. On his de- 
cease, Mary wrote to the archbishop of Glasgow in the follow- 
ing terms : — " Information has been received here of the death 
of the Earl of Bothwell, and that before his decease he made 
an ample confession of his crime, and declared himself the 
guilty author of the assassination of the late king, my hus- 
band, of which he expressly acquitted me, testifying to my 
innocence, on the peril of his soul's damnation ; and since, if 
this be true, this testimony would be of the greatest value to me 
against the false calumnies of my enemies, I beg of you to 
investigate the truth by all the means possible." 

This communication was sent to Elizabeth, and, strange to 
say, was by her suppressed. Happily for Mary, however, an 
original and authentic copy of Bothwell's declaration has 
recently been brought to light by the researches of Prince 
LabanofF, of Russia, which confirms her majesty's statement, 

o2 



150 MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

and proclaims to an inquiring posterity her perfect innocence 

I in the affair of Darnley's murder. 

' ' The Earl of Murray was now appointed Regent. Scarcely 

had he entered on his high office when the queen made her es- 

'■ '> ^l cape. From being a sad and helpless captive in a lonely tower, 

n'-L "■-/■'"' - . she was now at the head of a powerful confederation ; but the 

-■ , ^' X ^ battle of Langside ended the struggle, for there the queen was 

completely defeated, and compelled to seek refuge in England.. 

^> . - , On arriving in England, the Queen of Scots encountered 

,, li^ messengers from Elizabeth. They expressed on behalf of the 

queen, how much she regretted that circumstances prevented 

her receiving her royal sister in a manner befitting her rank and 

station. Circumstances of a peculiar character prevented her 

doing this. She could not welcome her as a queen ; she could 

not receive her to her presence until the unfortunate death of 

Lord Darnley was thoroughly cleared up. It was absolutely 

necessary, so the messengers argued, that Mary should justify 

herself with respect to that event before she could properly 

claim friendship or protection. 

Mary Stuart instantly offered to plead her innocence to the 
satisfaction of her sister Elizabeth ; but scarcely had Eliza- 
beth received her letter, when from an arbitrator she made 
herself judge, and naming commissioners to hear the parties, 
she summoned Murray to appear and accuse his sister. In 
answer to the summons Murray appeared, bringing with him 
a casket of letters, which contained evidence against the queen. 
These letters were declared to be forgeries. After an inquiry 
of live months, the queen of England informed the parties, 
that not being able, by their proceedings, to discover anything 
against the honour of either the accused or accuser, everything 
would remain in the same state until one or the other should 
be able to furnish fresh proofs. 



MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS. . 151 

So with this unsatisfactory decision, the Regent Murray 
returned to Scotland ; but Mary, instead of being permitted to 
enjoy her liberty, was conveyed as a prisoner to Carlisle Cas- 
tle, from the terrace of which she could perceive the blue 
mountains of her own land. 

As for Murray, he was shot in the streets of Linlithgow. 

Mary remained in confinement for nearly twenty years. In 
1586 she was removed to Fotheringay Castle. A correspondence 
was kept up between the two queens. Mary sought to excite 
the sympathy of Elizabeth. In this she failed. Mary felt 
that she was oppressed. Oppression will drive even a wise 
man mad. She grew impatient. Her religious enthusiasm 
was aroused. Friendly foes whispered that Elizabeth usurped 
her right ; that England's crown should belong to the Scot- 
tish queen. Had not the pope excommunicated Elizabeth ? 
had he not declared her illegitimate ? was it not worth a 
struggle — a crown of royalty, or a crown of mariyrdom ? An 
attempt was made to dethrone Elizabeth. It failed. Mary 
was implicated. And her fate was sealed. 

On the trial of the conspirators it appeared, that the Queen 
of Scots, who had held a correspondence with one Babington, 
had encouraged him in treasonable enterprizes, and it was re- 
solved by Elizabeth and her ministers, to bring Mary to a 
public trial, as being accessory to the conspiracy. Her 
papers were accordingly seized, her principal domestics 
arrested, and her two secretaries sent prisoners to London. 
After the necessary information had been obtained, forty com- 
missioners were appointed under the Great Seal, together with 
five of the judges, and were sent to Fotheringay Castle, to hear 
and decide the singular cause. 

An idea so repugnant to majesty as that of being arraigned 
for treason, had not once entered the mind of the Queen of 



152 MAllY, QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

Scots, though she no longer doulfted but that her destruction 
was determined on, nor had the strange resolution yet reached 
her ears in the solitude of her prison. She received the in- 
telligence, however, without emotion or astonishment, and 
she protested in the most solemn manner, that she had never 
countenanced any attempt against the life of Elizabeth, though 
at the same time she refused to acknowledge the authority of 
her commissioners. " I came into England," said she, " an 
independent sovereign, to implore the queen's assistance, not 
to subject myself to her authority ; nor is my spirit so broken 
by past misfortunes, or so intimidated by present dangers, as 
to stoop to anything unbecoming the majesty of a crowned 
head, or that will disgrace the ancestors from whom I am des- 
cended, and the son to whom I shall bequeath my throne. If 
I must be tried, princes alone can be my peers. The Queen 
of England's subjects, however noble their birth, are of a rank 
inferior to mine. Ever since my arrival in this kingdom, I 
have been confined as a prisoner. Its laws never afforded me 
protection. Let them not be perverted in order to take away 
my life." 

Mary was, however, at last persuaded to appear before the 
commissioners, " to hear and to give answer to the accusations 
which should be brought against her ;" though she still re- 
fused to acknowledge the jurisdiction of the court. The chan- 
cellor endeavoured to vindicate its authority by pleading the 
supreme jurisdiction of the English laws over every one that 
resided in England. The lawyers of the crown opened the 
charges against the Queen of Scots ; the chief evidence against 
her arose from the declaration of her secretaries ; but what 
was the testimony of these men worth when they were confined 
in dungeons, and threatened with the torture ? The evidence 
was such as would not now affect the life of the meanest cul- 



MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS. 155 

prit ; but notwithstanding this, she was pronounced guilty, a 
verdict which was approved by the parliament of England. 

Sentence of death was passed. 

There was a long delay. Elizabeth feared to put the sen- 
tence into execution. Dark stories are told of proposed 
assassinations ; but at length the warrant was signed by the 
hand of Elizabeth, and the Earls of Kent and Shrewsbury 
were sent to acquaint the prisoner with the fact. 

The Earls of Kent and Shrewsbury, and Sir E. Beale, sent 
word to the queen that they wished to speak to her. She 
was at that time ill, and sent a reply stating that she was then 
in bed, but that if the matter would not admit of delay, she 
would get up. The noblemen requested her to do so, and she 
rising from her bed, and slipping on a dressing gown, sat 
down at a small table, and awaited their coming. Bareheaded 
the noblemen entered, followed by the domestics weeping 
bitterly. Mary knew their mission. They stated their fatal 
errand, produced their warrant, signed with the queen's name, 
and sealed with the Great Seal in yellow wax. Sir Robert 
Beale was requested by Mary to read the document, which he 
did with evident emotion. 

" Elizabeth, by the grace of God, Queen of England, France, 
and Ireland, &c., to our trusty and well-beloved cousins, George, 
Earl of Shrewsbury, Earl Marshal of England ; Henry, Earl 
of Kent ; Henry, Earl of Derby ; George, Earl of Cumber- 
land ; Henry, Earl of Pembroke ; greeting : 

" Considering the sentence passed by us, and others of our 
council, nobility, and judges, on the late Queen of Scotland, 
named Mary, daughter and heiress of James V., King of 
Scotland, commonly called Queen of Scotland and Dowager 
of France ; which sentence all the estates of our kingdom, 
assembled in our last parliament, not only confirmed, but, 



1 54 MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

after mature deliberation, ratified, as being just and reasonable ; 
considering, also, the earnest prayer and request of our sub- 
jects, who solicit and urge us to proceed to the publication of 
the same, and to carry it into execution on her person, as they 
adjudge her to have justly merited, and* that the delaying of 
the same has, and will, daily bring certain and evident danger 
not only on ourself, but also on themselves and their posterity, 
as well as on the public welfare of this kingdom, and would 
also endanger the church and the true religion of Christ, with 
the peace and tranquillity of this state, though the said sentence 
has been delayed by our proclamation, and though we have 
still, up to the present time, abstained from granting a war- 
rant for the execution of it ; nevertheless, for the full satisfac- 
tion of the said requests made by the estates of our parliament, 
from which we daily hear that all our well-beloved subjects, 
as well as the nobility, our most wise, great, and religious 
councillors, and even those of the lower orders, with all 
humility and care for our life, and, consequently, from fear 
they entertain of the ruin of the present most excellent and 
happy state of the kingdom, if we refrain from the final execu- 
tion, while they consent to, and desire the said execution ; and 
although the general and continual requests, prayers, councils, 
and advice, are in this matter contrary to our natural incli- 
nation ; nevertheless, being convinced of the urgent weight of 
their continual entreaties, tending towards the safety of our 
person, as well as to that of the public and private w^elfare of 
our kingdom, we have at last consented and permitted that 
justice shall take its course ; and for the execution of the 
same, considering the great confidence we have in your fidelity 
and loyalty, together with the love and affection which you 
bear for our person and our country, of which you are the 
most noble and principal members, we inform, and for the 



MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS. 155 

discharge of the same we order you, that, on seeing this, you 
repair to Fotheringay Castle, where the late Queen of Scot- 
land now is, in custody of our friend and loyal servant and 
counsellor, Sir Araias Paulet, and there you shall take into 
your charge, and see that, in compliance with our commands, 
execution be done upon her person, in presence of yourselves 
and of the said Sir Amias Paulet, and of all other officers of 
justice whom you shall command to be present ; wherefore, to 
this effect, and that the said execution be performed in such 
manner and form, and in such time and place, and by such 
persons as you five, four, three, or two shall, in your discretion 
find expedient, notwithstanding any laws, statutes, and ordi- 
nances whatsoever, contrary to these presents sealed with our 
Great Seal of England, let them serve to every one of you, 
and to all those who shall be present, or who shall do any- 
thing by your commands, in reference to the above-mentioned 
execution, as a full and sufficient discharge from all respon- 
sibility for ever. 

" Given and done at our palace of Greenwich, on the first day 
of February (10th February, new style), in the twenty-ninth 
year of our reign." 

Mary listened to the reading of the document with the 
greatest calmness, saying, the soul was undeserving the joys 
of heaven which would shrink from the blow of an executioner. 
She immediately began to prepare for her end. She asked 
for a priest, but this was cruelly denied her ; the services of a 
protestant minister were offered, but these she declined. With 
a calmness and self-possession, rarely witnessed in such cir- 
cumstances, she set her house in order as she must surely 
die. 

*' My children," said she, as the domestics wept around 
her, " this is not the moment for weeping ; for if you love me, 



156 MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

you ought to rejoice that the Lord, by letting me die for His 
cause, removes me from the tortures which I have suffered 
for nineteen years : as for me, I thank Him that He allows 
me to die for the glory of His religion, and of His church. 
So have patience ; while the men prepare supper we wull 
pray." 

After supper she had the whole of her property, dresses, 
jewels, rings, money, and other valuables brought into her 
room, and having made an inventory of the whole, she then 
proceeded to make her will, and wrote off as quickly as she 
could move her pen, almost without raising it from the paper, 
two large sheets, containing numerous items, in which every- 
body at all connected with her, whether present or absent, 
was remembered. We present a specimen : — 

" I wish the two thousand four hundred franks which I 
give Jane Kennedy to be paid her in money as was formerly 
stated. I also give Fontenay Douglas's pension, which has 
reverted to me, for his services and expenses. 

And I wish the four thousand crowns of that banker, whose 
name I forget, to be obtained and paid ; the Bishop of Glas- 
gow will remember ; but if this cannot be effected by the 
usual means, it is my desire that the money be taken out of 
the first receipts. 

The ten thousand franks which the ambassador of France 
received from me, are to be distributed, as follows, among my 
servants : — 

Two thousand franks to my physician. 

Two thousand to Elizabeth Courle. 

Two thousand to Sebastian Page. , 

Two thousand to Mary Page, my goddaughter, 

A thousand franks to Beauregard, 

A thousand to Gorjon. 



i 



MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS. 157 

A thousand to Gervais. 

Iloreover, I wish five thousand franks to be taken out of 
the other moneys of my revenue and surplus from Secondat, 
to be distributed among the children of Eheims. 

To my school girls I leave two thousand franks. 

To four beggars I leave such sums as my executors shall 
think fit, and as means will allow. 

I also leave five hundred franks to the hospitals. 

I give a thousand franks to Martin, my head cook. 

A thousand to Annibal, and beg my cousin, de Guise, his 
godfather, to find a place for him in his service for life. 

I leave five hundred franks to Nicholas, and five hundred 
franks for his daughters, when they marry." 

Her will being finished, she wrote a letter to the King of 
France, telling him she was about to die, and requesting him 
to attend to certain provisions in her will. 

It was the practice of Mary to have the history of some 
saint read to her after evening prayer, and on this occasion, 
she was unwilling to depart from her custom. But she was 
troubled which to select. At length she fixed upon that of 
the penitent thief. She listened to the story of his reviling ; 
listened with interest as they read of his wonderful change, 
his rebuking his fellow-culprit, his prayer to dying Jesus, 
and the words of comfort that the Master spoke. Said she — 

'* Great sinner as he was, he had still sinned less than I 
have." 

Mary lay down, but she did not sleep — there was a 
long, long sleep for her on the morrow ! At length that mor- 
row came. Mary was at prayer when the commissioners 
arrived, and the sheriff of Northampton summoned her to 
execution. Some few of her domestics were allowed to fol- 
low her, but the request that they might be permitted to do 

p 



'^-^,MJ^ 



158 MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

SO, was at first sternly refused. In the great hall of the castle 
a scafFold had been erected. It was a platform of planks, 
standing about two feet high, twelve feet broad, and was sur- 
rounded by a railing ; it was covered with black serge. A 
small stool, a cushion to kneel on, and a block, covered like 
the scaffold with black cloth, were placed in the middle. 
The hall was filled with lords, knights, and gentlemen, and 
when the queen had ascended the scaffold, the sentence of 
death was read. When Beale had finished, and cried '' God 
save Queen Elizabeth," no voice echoed the cry, and Mary 
crossed herself. 

Then the queen spoke : — 

" My lords, I was born a queen and a sovereign princess, 
and am not, therefore, subject to the laws ; a near relative am 
I, too, of the Queen of England, and the lawful heiress to her 
crown. I have been a prisoner here for a long time, and have 

^' endured much suffering and trouble, which no one had any 

>C^ ^*'**¥' right to inflict upon me, and now, by way of crowning all, I 

f'iAr ^^t^i ^"^ about to be deprived of life. My lords, be you all wit- 
nesses that I die in the catholic faith, thanking the Almighty^ 
that He has vouchsafed to me the power of dying in His holy 
cause ; and I protest now, as I have ever done, both in public 
and in private, that I have never conspired for, consented to, 
or desired the death of the queen ; nor have I contrived aught 
against her person ; but have, on the contrary, always loved 
her, and have always offered just and reasonable terms, on 
which to put an end to the troubles of the kingdom, and to 
deliver me from ray captivity ; and you well know, my lords, 
that I have none all this, without ever having been honoured 
with a reply from her. At last, then, my enemies have at- 
tained their object, which was to put me to death ; but I par- 
don them all, as I pardon all who have attempted aught 



t^ 



MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS. 159 

against myself. After my death it will be known who these 
enemies were ; but I die without accusing anybody, for fear 
the Lord should hear and avenge me." 

On the scaffold the Dean of Peterborough offered his ser- 
vices, and strove to convince Mary that her religion was a 
false one. But the queen steadily refused to listen, saying, 
she would die in the faith in which she had lived. Then the 
dean prayed aloud, and the eyes of Mary were bandaged by 
one of her women. She, supposing that her head would be 
stricken off with a sword, after the French fashion, sat still, 
perfectly erect, waiting for the fatal blow, but at last she was 
made to understand that she must kneel, and lay her head on 
the block ; she did so, and at three blows her head was 
stricken from her body. The axe used upon the occasion, 
was simply a wood cutter's hatchet. 

The executioner held up the head, repeating the words, 
" God save Queen Elizabeth." 

Thus perished Mary Stuart, Queen of Scots, the most 
lovely of women, the most unhappy of sovereigns. Brantome 
says: — " Those who wish to write on this illustrious queen, 
have two very copious subjects — her life, and her death." 
Her numerous misfortunesf the length and severity of her 
confinement, and the cruel persecutions to which she had been 
subjected on account of her religion, had rivetted in her mind 
an extreme degree of biogtry ; and such was the violent spirit 
and principles of that age, that it is less a matter of astonish- 
ment that her zeal, her resentment, and her inter«st concur- 
ring, induced her to give her consent to a design, which so 
many gentlemen of rank and fortune, prompted only by the 
first of these motives, had planned against Elizabeth. 



LADY MOEGAN, 



A LIGHT agreeable writer is Lady Morgan. Nothing lias 
come amiss to her in the department of literature. Travelling, 
she has noted down in her own peculiar manner, glimpses of 
scenery and touches of character which would, by a common 
observer, have been passed unnoticed. Her poetry is by 
no means contemptible, and her novels are very charming 
productions. 

She was born in Ireland, where her father, Mr. Owenson, 
was a respectable actor, a hero of sock and buskin, who had 
collected around him a circle of admiring friends. He had 
distinguished himself in another way beside that of the stage,, 
for he had written some very popular Irish songs, good old 
Irish melodies, that Brian Boru might have sung. Miss 
Owenson inherited her father's love of minstrelsy. Very early 
in life she published a small volume of poetical effusions, and 
certain Irish melodies, which became at once established 
favourites. Among them is the sweet song of" Kate Kearney." 

Like Frances Burney, Miss Owenson became a novelist 
while still in her teens. The " Novice of St. Dominick," 
" St. Clair," and " The Wild Irish Girl," were successively 
published. The last was the favourite ; it passed through 
seven editions in two years. Her novels were far different 
from the ordinary run of such productions. The Minerva 
press was issuing its peculiar literature, and novel readers 
were beguiled with subterranean passages, robbers, murders, 
unexpected denoumens, and the rest of it. Miss Owenson 



LADY MORGAN. 161 

endeavoured to depict natural manners, to hold the mirror up 
to nature. And surely, if we are to derive any advantage 
from fiction, if moral lessons are to be taught in the way of 
story-telling, there should be something like life in the 
characters and in the plot. The novels at the beginning of 
the present century were caricatures of nature. The stream 
of letter-press that ran through meadows of margin, never 
fairly mirrored the world, but distorted it by its own peculiar 
ripples. One class of novelists wrote only to excite ; another^ 
alas, the heaviest, wrote to teach, but made every character a 
mere machine for the grinding of morals. Johnson had done 
the latter in his Rasselas ; Mrs. Shelley was doing the former 
in her Frankenstein. Miss Owenson endeavoured to be 
natural. Her men and women were not : — 

" Lifeless, but life-hke, and awful to view, 
Like the figures in arras that gloomily glare, 
Stirr'd by the breath of the midnight air ;" 

but real resemblances of the people in the world about us. 

She had a hard fight to gain distinction. A Cerberus of 
raillery, sarcasm, and vituperation, seemed to bar her progress. 
But she triumphed. The reputation of her writings did the 
office of a blue ribbon and a coach and six, and she was 
admitted into the presence of th& great. She avowed liberal 
principles, and was bold and careless in the avowal. But it 
was said, that, with all her wit and brilliancy, she worshipped 
the fashions and the follies of the great. Her politics some- 
times brought her into collision with those whom she least 
intended to offend, but her strong national enthusiasm, which 
had been aroused in childhood, never died out. In her pre- 
face to O'Donnell, she says : — 

"After all, however, if I became that reviled but now very ■ 

p2 



162 LADY MORGAN, 

very fashionable personage, a female politician, it was much in 
the same way as the Bourgeois Gentilhomme spoke prose 
without knowing it, a circumstance, perhaps, not uncommon 
with Irish writers. * * * For myself, at least, born and 
dwelling in Ireland, amidst ray countrymen and their suffer- 
ings, I saw, and I described, I felt, and I pleaded, and if a 
political bias was ultimately taken, it originated in the natural 
condition of things, and not in ' malice aforethought' of the 
writer." 

Sir Walter Scott has given high praise to the writings of 
Lady Morgan. It has been justly said, that whether it is a 
review in the Phoenix Park, or a party at the Castle, or a 
masquerade, a meeting of United Irishmen, a riot in Dublin, 
or a Jug-day at Bog-Moy, in every change of scene and situ- 
ation, the authoress wielded the pen of a ready writer. But 
over it all there is the atmosphere of the boudoir and the 
drawing-room ; her love for great people and fashionable 
quarters does peep out ; withal she was somewhat of the tuft- 
hunter, both before and after she became Lady Morgan. 
Talent, genius, wit, humour, could not keep her from this. 
Ah me, what a Vanity Fair we live in ! 



iiji 



>i 




( 






it 



COUNTESS OF BUCKINGHAMSHIRE. 



In the days of good King George 11. , many old titles be- 
came extinct and many new titles were created. For years a 
struggle had been going on between two regimes. The 
dynasty of the Stuarts and the dynasty of Hanover contended 
for the mastery. There were many high-born noble-hearted 
men, who were willing to risk all, and to suffer the loss of all, 
in that severe and long-continued contest. Allied to the 
house of Stuart, there were many whose names stand high in 
the records of history. But they were allied to a falling house. 
The glory of the Stuarts had departed. Like the Henries of 
France, the Stuarts of Scotland were a doomed race. One 
after another, they had passed away by grief or violent 
death — the monarch who united the English and the Scottish 
. ■ crown, was himself the son of a murdered mother, and the 

^.t father of a murdered son. After James II. had been driven 
V ' from the throne, after the decisive battle at Boyne water, 
the struggle, so far as he was concerned, was permitted to 
subside, but his sou and his son's son kept up the fight ; the 
young Pretender and " bonnie prince Charlie" engaged in the 
"■ Jj^v warfare, and fought for the crown. Drinking Gaelic toasts 
';[ and mixing freely with his plaided and kilted adherents, this 
young man began his wild and perilous adventure, and to the 

W shrill music of the pibroch advanced to Derby. The begin- 
ning and the ending of the struggle w^e need not here recapi- 
* 1^ tulate, nor tell how hewas compelled to retreat, was victorious 
e**^ ^,. at Falkirk, but completely defeated in the short and bloody 



164 COUNTESS OF BUCKINGHAMSHIRE. 

battle of Culloden, a final battle ; final in a double sense, for 
with it perished the last hope of the Stuarts. 

*' Culloden, still the angry blast 
Is singing o'er thy desert waste : 
Nor bee is here, nor beast is nigh, 
Nor wild bird with her wailing cry. 

Ben-Nevis, with his stormy face, 
Still frowns upoq his giant race — 
Still fitful from his icy crown 
The desert blast comes howling down ; 
It sweeps along the blasted heath, 
And here upon this bed of death 
It chills my blood — 

Human hearts by glory led — 
This, this is honour's gory bed. 

Yet, o'er the dark heath all around, 
To you no monument is found, 
Save, fertilised by blood of men. 
The green turf marks the ranks of slain. 
Where, underneath, the bones still lie 
Of those who wandered here to die ; — 

Human hearts by glory led. 
This, this is honour's gory bed ! 

And still, and thus beneath the sun, 
Are kingdoms lost and kingdoms won. 
Still men and midges dance and play, 
And thus they spend their little day ; 
And thus, and thus the cold wind moans 
And whistles o'er their moulder'd bones." 

Shortly after this battle, when honours were being conferred 
on those who had distinguished themselves in the struggle, 
distinguished of course on the side of the ruling power, the 
title of Earl of Buckinghamshire was created. So the title 
is not an old one, but true nobility does not depend on a long 
line of ancestry. 



COUNTESS OF BUCKINGHAMSHIRE, 165 

The present Earl is the sixth that has borne the title. 

The Countess of Buckinghamshire, a lady for whom the 
greatest respect and admiration must ever be entertained, has 
distinguished herself by her private virtue and exemplary con- 
duct. Coronets can never ennoble base passions or vicious 
inclinations, but virtue and intelligence add fresh lustre to 
the crown. It is a pleasant thing to find among those whose 
high position places them more especially in the path of 
temptation, those virtues and excellences which adorn the 
character in whatever position that character is found. 



LADY GEIZEL BAILLIE. 



On the 25th of December, in the year of the great plague, 
1665, Grizel Hume was born, at Eedbraes Castle, Berwickshire. 
Her father was Sir Patrick Hume, of Polwarth, and her 
mother, Grizel Ker, daughter of Sir Thomas Ker of Cavers. 
Both parents were zealously attached to the Presbyterian forms 
of worship, and church government, in which all their children 
were educated. 

Of her early childhood but little is known, except that she 
always evinced the utmost piety and prudence. It was a 
melancholy period of Scottish history ; a time that called for 
a constitutional resistance to the arbitrary measures of the 
monarch. But they who resisted placed themselves in a very 
dangerous position. To love the country better than the king, 
and law better than loyalty, was likely to end in imprisonment 
and death. The scaffold and the field had streamed with 
noble blood, and covenanting worshippers had been scattered 
by the charge of the king's dragoons. 

All England had been shaken. Tht king had been executed. 
The parliament had ruled instead cf the prince. Oliver 
Cromwell had beaten down old structures, and built up new 
edifices. But Oliver was dead. New edifices had been 
levelled, and old structures re-erected — the good old laws, 
the good old sports, the good old customs, the good old morality 
had come back, and unhappy Scotland felt the change. 

As the tyrannical measures of the court, and the un- 
constitutional conduct of the monarch became more and more 



LADY GRIZEL BAILLIE. 



167 



apparent, a faithful band of patriots, under the Duke of Ham- 
ilton, began to offer some resistance. Resistance brought 
down the penalties of law. An arbitrary imprisonment of two 
years, so far from repressing, seemed only to lend new ardour 
to the spirit of Sir Patrick Hume, and he became more and 
more deeply connected with the secret councils, by which 
efforts were being made to exclude the Duke of York from 
the succession. These doings brought him into jeopardy, 
and it was then that the heroism and devotedness of his 
daughter was first evinced. 

In the summer of 1684, Sir Patrick was warned, by the 
fate of several of his associates, that he could no longer safely 
appear in public ; and he accordingly left his house of Redbraes, 
and, while most of the family supposed him to have gone upon 
a distant journey, took up his residence in the sepulchral 
vault of his family, underneath the neighbouring parish church 
of Polwarth. His wife, his eldest daughter, and one James 
Winter, a carpenter, alone knew of his retreat, to which the 
last-mentioned individual was employed to convey, by night, a 
bed and bed-clothes, while Grizel, now in her nineteenth year, 
undertook the duty of supplying him every night with food 
and other necessaries. The only light which he enjoyed in 
this dismal abode was by a slit in the wall, through which no 
one could see any thing within. Grizel, 'though at first full of 
those fears for the places and objects of mortality which are 
usually inspired into children, soon so far mastered her 
ordinary sensations, as to be able to stumble through the 
churchyard at darkest midnight, afraid of nothing but the 
possibility of leading to the discovery of her father. The 
minister's house was as usual near the church : at her first 
visit, his dogs kept up such a barking, as put her in the 
utmost fear of a discovery. This difficulty was immediately 



168 LADY GRIZEL BAILLIE. 

set aside by the ingenuity of Lady Hume, who, under the 
pretence of a rabid animal having been seen in the neighbour- 
iiood, prevailed on the minister next day to hang every dog 
he had. There was another difficulty in secreting victuals 
without exciting suspicions among the domestics and younger 
children. The unfortunate gentleman was fond of sheep's 
head, and Grizel one day took an opportunity, without being 
observed by her brothers and sisters, to turn one nearly entire 
into her lap, with the design of carrying it that night to her 
father. When her brother Sandy (afterwards second Earl of 
Marchmont) again looked on the dish, and saw that it was 
empty, he exclaimed, "Mother, will ye look at Grizel? — 
while we have been supping our broth, she has eaten up the 
whole sheep's head ?" The incident only served that night 
as an amusing story for Sir Patrick, who good-naturedly 
requested that Sandy might have a share of the dish on the 
next occasion. It was Grizel's custom every night to remain 
as long with her father as she supposed to be prudent, in 
order to enliven him by her company ; and it would appear 
that more cheerfulness generally prevailed at these meetings, 
than is sometimes to be found in scenes of the greatest secu- 
rity and comfort. During the day, his chief amusement 
consisted in reading Buchanan's version of the psalms, which 
he thus impressed io thoroughly on his memory, that, forty 
years after, when considerably above eighty years of age, he 
could repeat any one at bidding, without omitting a word. 

History records many affecting instances of devoted atten- 
tion and assiduity from man to man, from son to father, from 
father to son, but there is a gentler and mightier influence 
exercised by woman. Says Sir Walter Scott :— • 

" O woman, in our hours of ease, 
Uncertain, coy, and bard to please, 



LADY GRIZEL BAILLIE. 169 

And variable as the shade, 
By the light quiv'ring aspen made. 
But when affliction wrings the brow, 
A ministering angel thou." 

During the time he spent in the vault, Lady Hume and 
Jamie Winter had been contriving a more agreeable place of 
concealment in his own house. In one of the rooms on the 
ground floor, underneath a place usually occupied by a bed, 
Grizel and Winter dug a hole in the earth, using their fingers 
alone, to prevent noise, and carrying out the earth in sheets 
to the garden. The severity of this task may be judged of 
from the fact, that, at its conclusion, the young lady had not 
a nail upon her fingers. In the hole thus excavated, Winter 
placed a box large enough to contain a bed, boring the boards 
above it with holes for the admission of air. Sir Patrick 
seems to have occupied the room, of which his daughter kept 
the key, the box being esteemed as a place to which he could 
resort, in the event of any government party coming to search 
the house. 

This heroic service required no small amount of courage. 
In danger every hour of discovery, and the consequent penal- 
ties for treason, this devoted lady must have led a strange and 
fearful life. But she knew no fear ; she braved all things : 
and thus in every age, and under every circumstance, has the 
female character shone out with peculiar brilliancy. Man 
may grow weary ; more impetuous but less enduring, he may 
give way — 

" But she of gentler nature, softer, dearer, 
Of daily life, the active, kindly cheerer ; 
With gen'rous bosom, age, or childhood shielding. 
And in the storms of life, though mov'd, unyielding ; 



170 LADY GRIZEL BAILLIE, 

Strength in her gentleness, hope in her sorrow, 

Whose darkest hours some ray of brightness borrow 

From better days to come, whose meek devotion 

Calms every wayward passion's wild commotion ; 

In want and suffering, soothing, useful, sprightly, 

Bearing the press of evil hap so lightly, 

'Till evil's self seems its stronghold betraying. 

To the sweet witchery of such winsome playing ; 

Bold from affection, if from nature fearful ; 

With varying brow, sad, tender, anxious, cheerful — 

This is meet partner for the loftiest mind. 

With crown or helmet grac'd ; yea, this is womankind !" 

Another of the heroic services of Grizel Hume, at this 
period of her life, was the carrying of a letter from her father 
to his friend Kobert Baillie, of Jerviswood, then imprisoned on 
a charge of treason in the Tolbooth of Edinburgh. Baillie 
had been an associate of Sir Patrick in the designs which 
terminated so unfortunately for the Whig party, and it was 
of the utmost importance to both, that an interchange of 
intelligence should take place between them. The heroic 
girl readily undertook this difficult and dangerous business, 
and managed it with great dexterity, and perfect success. 
The son of Mr. Baillie, a youth about her own age, had been 
recalled from his education in Holland to attend his father's 
trial. In the gloom of a jail these two young persons met, 
and formed an attachment, destined to lead to a happy union. 
But all contemplation of such an event was for the present 
clouded. On the 24th of December, in the year just men- 
tioned, Baillie suffered the award of an unrighteous sentence 
upon the scaffold, and Sir Patrick Hume, too much alarmed 
to remain any longer in Scotland, proceeded in disguise to 
Loudon, and finally, by France, into Holland, where a num- 
ber of other patriots had found refuge. In the ensuing year 



LADY GRIZEL BAILLIE. 171 

be acted as one of the two seconds in command in the unfortu- 
nate expedition of the Earl of Argyle, and once more with 
great difficulty made an escape to Holland, while his pro- 
perty was forfeited by the government. He now established 
himself at Utrecht, with his family, and commenced a life of 
penury, forming a remarkable contrast to his former circum- 
stances. One child, named Juliana, had been left in Scotland 
on account of bad health. Some months after settling in 
Holland, it was thought necessary that this girl should be 
sent for, and Grizel was commissioned to return in order to 
bring her away. She was entrusted, at the same time, with 
the management of some business of her father's, and directed 
to collect what she could of the money that was due to them. 
All this she performed with her usual discretion and success, 
though not without encountering adventures that would have 
completely overwhelmed the greater part of her sex. After 
enduring a storm at sea, the terrors of which were aggravated 
by the barbarity of a brutal shipmaster, the two girls were 
landed at Brill ; and from thence they set out the same night 
for Rotterdam, in company with a Scotch gentleman whom 
they accidentally met with. It was a cold, wet night ; and 
Juliana Hume, who was hardly able to walk, soon lost her 
shoes in the mud, Grizel then took the ailing child on her 
back, and carried h^r all the way to Rotterdam, while the 
gentleman, a sympathizing fellow exile, bore their small 
baggage. All these distresses were forgotten when she once 
more found herself in the bosom of her family. 

Holland was the refuge for poor driven out Englishmen,' 
It was the wanderer's home. Thither went the early Non- 
conformists in their good ship Mayflower, and from thence 
they sailed to form a little colony in the far west, a colony 
which afterwards became one of the mightiest powers in the 



172 LADY GRIZEL BAILLIE. 

world. In Holland, Sir Patrick spent three years and a half. 
His income was small ; and more than that, it was precarious. 
A fourth part of it was required for house rent. He was 
unable to keep any domestics except a girl to wash clothes, 
but nothing daunted by poverty, his heroic daughter performed 
the greater part of the drudgery. It is an easy matter to 
play the hero before an admiring world, and under the bright 
sunshine, but not so easy to be heroic in common life ; yet 
there the truest heroism is oftentimes exerted. According to 
the simple and affecting narrative of her daughter. Lady Murray 
of Stanhope, this amiable and virtuous woman was often up 
more than two nights in the week. " She went to the market, 
went to the mill to have their corn ground, which, it seems is 
the way with good managers there — dressed the linen, cleaned 
the house, made ready dinner, mended the children's stockings 
and other clothes, made what she could for them, and, in 
short, did every thing* Her sister Christian, who was a year 
or two younger, diverted her father and mother and the rest, 
who were fond of music : out of their small income they bought 
a harpsichord for little money. My aunt played and sung well, 
and had a great deal of life and humour, but no turn for busi- 
ness. Though my mother had the same qualifications, and 
liked it as well as she did, she was forced to drudge : and many 
jokes used to pass between the sisters about their different 
occupations. Every morning before six, my mother lighted 
her father's fire in his study, then waked him, and got what 
he usually took as soon as he got up, warm small beer with a 
spoonful of bitters in it ; then took up the children, and brought 
them all to his room, where he taught them everything that 
was fit for their age ; some Latin, others French, Dutch, 
geography, writing, reading, English, &c., and my grand- 
mother taught them what was necessary on her part. Thus 



LADY GRIZEL BAILLIE. 173 

he employed and diverted himself all tLe time he ^as there, 
not being able to afford putting them to school ; and my mother, 
when she had a moment, took a lesson with the rest in French 
and Dutch, and also diverted herself with music. I have now 
a book of songs, of her writing when she was there ; many of 
them interrupted, half-writ, some broke off in the middle of a 
sentence : she had no less a turn for mirth and society than 
any of the family, when she could come at it without neglecting 
what she thought more necessary." 

One of these songs has been preserved, and as a beautiful 
pastoral composition deserves all praise. We present it in 
its old Scottish dress. 

"There ance was a may, and she lo'ed na men, 
She biggit her bonnie bower down in yon glen ; 
But now she cries dool and a-well-a-day ! 
Come down the green gate, and come here away. 
But now she cries, &c. 

"When bonnie young Johnie came over the sea, 
He said he saw naething sae lovely as me ; 
He hecht me baith rings and mony braw things ; 
And were na my heart licht, I wad die. 

He had a wee sister that lo'ed na me, 

Because I was twice as bonnie as she ; 

She raised such a pother 'twixt him and his mother, 

That were na my heart licht, I wad die. 

The day it was set, and the bridal to be. 
The wife took a dwam, and lay down to die ; 
She raained and she graned out of dolour and pain. 
That he vowed he never wad see me again. 

His kin was for ane of a higher degree, 
Said, what had he to do wi' the likes of me I 
Albeit I was bonnie, I was na for Johnie : 
And were na my heart licht, I wad die. 

q2 



174 LADY GRIZEL EATLLIE^ 

His sister she was baith wylie and slie, 
She spied me as I came o'er the lea ; 
And then she ran in and made a loud din : 
Believe your ain een an ye trow na me. 

His bonnet stood ay fu' round on his brow, 
His auld ane looks aye as weel as some's new j 
Bur now he lets't wear ony gate it will hing, 
And casts hirasell dowie upon the corn-bing. 

And now he gaes daundering about the dykes. 
And a' he dow do is to hund the tykes ; 
The live-lang night he ne'er steeks his ee ; 
And were na my heart licht, I wad die. 

Were I young for thee, as I hae been, 
We should have been galloping down on yon green, 
And linking it blythe on the lily-white lea; 
And wow gin I were but young for thee !" 

It is not an easy matter to keep the heart " licht" when 
poverty and suiFering are within the dwelling, when we know 
the misery of being very poor, and when united to that poverty 
there is the recollection of better and happier times. Her 
eldest brother, Patrick, and her lover, Mr. Baillie, who suffered 
under the consequences of his father's attainder, went together 
into the guards of the Prince of Orange, till such time as they 
could be better provided for. " Her constant attention," 
continues Lady Murray, " was to have her brother appear right 
in his linen and dress ; they wore little point cravats and cuffs, 
which many a night she sat up to have in as good order for him 
as any in the place : and one of their greatest expenses was in 
dressing him as he ought to be. As their house was always 
full of the unfortunate banished people like themselves, they 
seldom went to dinner without three or four or five of them 
to share with them." It used to excite their surprise, that 



LADY GRIZEL BAILLIE. 175 

notwithstanding this hospitality their limited resources were 
sufficient except on rare occasions to supply their wants. 

When subsequently invested with title, and the wife of a 
wealthy gentleman, the subject of our memoir used to declare 
that these years of privation and drudgery had been the 
most delightful of her whole life ; a circumstance not surpri- 
sing, when We consider the gratification which high moral 
feelings like hers could not fail to derive from exercise of so 
peculiar a nature. Some of the distresses of the exiled family 
only served to supply them with amusement. Andrew, a boy, 
afterwards a judge of the Court of Session, was one day sent 
down to the cellar for a glass of alabast beer, the only liquor 
with which Sir Patrick could entertain his friends. On his 
returning with the beer, Sir Patrick said, " Andrew, what is 
that in your other hand ?" It was the spigot, which the youth 
had forgot to replace, and the want of which had already lost 
them the whole of their stock of alabast. This occasioned 
them much mirth, though they perhaps did not know where 
to get more. It was the custom at Utrecht to gather money 
for the poor, by going from house to house with a hand bell. 
One night the bell came, and there was nothing in the house 
but a single orkey, the smallest coin then used in Holland. 
They were so much ashamed of their poverty, that no one 
would go out with the money, till Sir Patrick himself at last 
undertook this troublesome little duty, observing philosophi- 
cally, " We can give no more than all we have." Their want 
of money often obliged them to pawn the small quantity of 
plate which they had brought from Scotland ; but they were 
ultimately able to take it all back with them, leaving no debt 
in the country of their exile. 

The evident leaning of James II. toward the Roman Catho- 
lic faith, had filled the minds of his people with fear and trem- 



176 LADY GRIZEL BAILLIE. 

bling ; at last his open avowal of attachment to Rome was 
the sign for open hostility. His cruelty and injustice had 
created disaffection in the hearts of Englishmen ; his attempt 
to rule absolute, and to carry out into practice 

" The right divine of kings to govern wrong," 
brought about the Revolution. Judge Jefferies was for giving 
every dissentient " a lick with the wrong side of the tongue." 
Men trembled for their lives and liberties. Colonel Kirke and 
his *' lambs" were busy. It was when things had arrived at 
this crisis, that the Prince of Orange, the son-in-law of James, 
began to lend an attentive ear to the earnest wish which had 
been expressed by some of the noblest men in all England, 
that he would come over and help them in establishing their 
protestant faith, and in asserting the rights and the liberties 
of the people. 

"When the Prince of Orange formed the resolution of inva- 
ding England, Sir Patrick Hume entered warmly into his 
views, and, by a letter which he addressed to the Scottish 
presbyterians, in which he passed a warm encomium on the 
personal character of the prince, was in no small degree in- 
strumental in gaining for him the friendship of that party. 
He accompanied the expedition, shared in its difficulties, and 
never left the prince's side till he was established in London. 
High honours, proportioned to his services and venerated 
character, now opened upon Sir Patrick. His attainder was 
reversed, his lands restored, and himself soon after created a 
peer, by the title of Lord Polwarth, and invested with the 
chief state office of his native country, that of Lord Chancellor. 
When the new system of things was settled, the younger part 
of the family were sent home under the care of a friend, and 
Lady Hume and Grizel came over with the Princess of Orange. 
The princess, now to become queen, wished to retain Grizel 



LADY GRIZEL BAILLIE. 177 

near her person, as one of her maids of honour ; but, though 
well qualified for that envied situation, this simple-hearted 
girl had the magnanimity to decline the appointment, and pre- 
ferred returning with her friends to Scotland — to the scenes 
and innocent affections of her childhood. Ever since her 
meeting with Mr. Bailliein the Tolbooth of Edinburgh, she had 
cherished an affection for him, which was warmly returned by 
him, though, in the days of their exile, it had been concealed 
from her parents. It was now declared, and Mr. Baillie 
having also regained his estates, there was no longer any ob- 
stacle to their union. They were married about two years 
after the Revolution, and their felicity during forty-eight years 
of wedded life seems to have been not disproportioned to their 
uncommon virtues and endowments. Lady Grizel — for to 
this designation she became entitled on the elevation of her 
father in 1697 to the rank of Earl of Marchmont — amidst all 
the glare and grandeur of high life, retained the same disin- 
terested singleness of heart, and simplicity of manners, which 
in youth had gained her universal regard, and graced her in 
every station. Her husband seems to have been worthy of 
her and of his name. He filled with great honour several 
important offices under government, and was not more distin- 
guished for his eminent abilities than for his high-toned in- 
tegrity. They had two children — Grizel, married to Sir 
Alexander Murray, of Stanhope, and the author of the narra- 
tive to which we are indebted for the materials of this 
memoir ; and Rachel, the common ancestress of the present 
Earl of Haddington, and the present Mr. Baillie, of Jervis- 
wood. Lady Grizel is thus described by her daughter : — 
*' Her actions showed what her mind was, and her outward 
appearance was no less singular. She was middle-sized, 
clever in her person, very handsome, with a life and sweetness in 



178 LADY GRIZEL BAILLIE. 

her eyes very uncommon, and gre*^at delicacy in all her features : 
her hair was chesnut, and to the last she had the finest com- 
plexion, with the clearest red in her cheeks and lips, that could 
be seen in one of fifteen, which, added to her natural consti- 
tution, might be owing to the great moderation she observed 
in her diet throughout her whole life. Porridge and milk was 
her greatest feast, and she by choice preferred them to every 
thing, though nothing came wrong to her that others could 
eat : water she preferred to any liquor : though often obliged 
to take a glass of wine, she always did it unwillingly, thinking 
it hurt her, and did not like it." 

Lady Grizel Baillie died on the sixth of December, 1746, 
in the eighty-first year of her age, having survived her hus- 
band about eight years. 



JANE SETMOUE. 



"The deed is done ! up, and let us follow the hunt," So 
spake King Henry VIII., as with his royal companions he 
halted under a wide-spreading tree in Epping forest. It was 
a bright, clear, beautiful day ; the sun shone pleasantly on trees 
and fields, and far away into forest depths, making a path of 
golden light along the stems and branches in its range, and on 
the soft and stealthy moss about the trunks of the old trees. 
Vistas of beauty opened everywhere into the heart and inner- 
most recesses of the wood ; and on the gnarled trunks, and 
twisted boughs, and ivy-covered stems, and trembling leaves, 
and bark-stripped bodies of ancient trees, the sunshine fell 
in all its glorious beauty. 

It was a gay group that had assembled in the forest. 
There was the king, and there were the courtiers in the rich 
and picturesque costume of the time, their slashed doublets, 
all bright and beautiful with jewels ; their velvet caps decora- 
ted with nodding plumes, and here and there a love- knot, the 
gift of some fair hand. They were there to cha'se the stag, 
and the day promised fair sport ; the huntsmen, with the 
hounds, stood ready to obey the king's behest. But they 
waited — the monarch himself sat moodily listening. Not a 
word was spoken, not a breath of wind was stirring. Sud- 
denly the heavy booming of a signal gun was heard ; the king 
doffed his bonnet, and with a flushed face, cried out the 
words we have before mentioned: "The deed is done! up, 
and let us follow the hunt !" 



180 JANE SEYMOUR. 

Yes, the deed was done. The gentle lady, Anne Boleyn, had 
suffered death. In the cold gloom of the Tower she had passed 
the last few days, and on that bright and beautiful morning 
had taken her farewell of nature, and on the Tower Green had 
submitted her neck to the stroke of the executioner. It was 
a strange matter for rejoicing. Henry had loved Anne 
Boleyn ; loved her as his ardent temperament alone could love, 
but that love was short and fitful. Once she had been the joy 
and pride of his heart ; for her he had resigned the wife of his 
youth — for her he had risked his popularity — for her he had 
become antagonistic to Rome and Rome's discipline ; but the 
harmony of their love had been disturbed — short as a love-song, 
it was over now, and while Anne languished away, the heart 
of the king was given to another, and Jane Seymour supplan- 
ted Anne Boleyn, as Anne had supplanted the patient Catherine, 

The headsman had lifted his Calais sword, and struck off 
her head at a blow. The signal gun from the Tower ramparts 
was fired. The sound was heard by all ; but upon none did 
it make less impression than on Henry. To him it was only 
the voice of deliverance, and he hailed it as good news. A 
new scene of his life was opening. Hurrah for the chase ! 

Jane Seymour was the eldest daughter of Sir John Seymour, 
of Wolf Hall, "Wiltshire. Like Anne Boleyn, she had passed 
much of her early life in France, both in the retinue of Mary 
Tudor and in that of Queen Claude. She was beautiful in 
person and talented in mind. She possessed both virtue and 
refinement. Anne Boleyn received her as an old friend, and 
she formed a part of her retinue, when that ill-starred woman 
ascended to her dangerous elevation. Henry noticed her. 
Her merit and beauty entirely captivated the heart of the in- 
constant monarch, and he resolved to sacrifice everything to 
the gratification of his new passion. 



JANE SEYMOUR. 181 

Anne little suspected treachery. The first intimation she 
received of the passion which Henry had conceived for the 
maiJ of honour, was by a most singular and unforeseen occur- 
rence. One day Anne came suddenly into the room, and 
found Jane Seymour contemplating attentively a portrait ; she 
stepped lightly, hastily towards her, and looked upon the 
picture. It was Henry VIII. "What followed, we have told 
already in the story of Anne Boleyn. 

On the day after the execution of Anne, Jane Seymour be- 
came the wife of the king. Jane is said to have been the 
fairest, the discreetest, and the most meritorious of all Henry's 
wives. But what opinion must we form of a woman who 
united herself to a man who was still, as it were, wet with the 
blood of an innocent and murdered wife? 

The Princess Mary, who had been treated by her father with 
great severity on account of her attachment to her mother, and 
her refusal to assent to the statutes which had been lately 
enacted, was persuaded by her friends to attempt a reconcilia- 
tion with the king at this juncture, when her sister Elizabeth 
was declared illegitimate. She therefore sent him a very sub- 
missive letter, imploring his forgiveness for her former dis- 
obedience, and promising to comply with all his injunctions 
for the future. Henry refused to receive her into his favour, 
unless she would sign the act of supremacy, the renunciation 
of the Bishop of Rome, and the nullity of her mother's mar- 
riage. Mary exerted her utmost address to elude the king's 
demand, but finding him inflexible, she was at last obliged to 
submit, and accordingly subscribed the articles. 

Elizabeth, who was now in the fourth year of her age, was 
divested of the title of Princess of Wales, which she had hitherto 
enjoyed ; but Henry gave her an excellent education, an.i 
treated her on all occasions with the greatest tenderness an'l 

R 



182 JANE SEYMOUR. 

affection. A new parliament, meeting in the month of Junej 
enacted a statute by which they repealed the former act of 
succession, declared the children of the king's first two mar- 
riages illegitimate, and excluded them from the inheritance of 
the crown ; confirmed the sentence of Anne Boleyn, adjudged 
the crown, after the king's death, to his issue by Queen Jane, 
or any other wife he might afterwards marry ; empowered his 
majesty to settle the manner in which they should succeed, 
either by will, or letters patent under the Great Seal ; and pro- 
nounced all those who should maintain the validity of his first 
two marriages, guilty of high treason. Pope Paul III. was no 
sooner apprised of Anne's fate, than he began to entertain 
hopes of seeing all that had been done to abridge the papal 
power in England revoked, and in these sentiments made some 
proposals to Cassali, the English agent at Kome. But in 
these hopes Pope Paul III. was doomed to disappointment. 
Instead of lessening the desire of the great '* Defender of the 
Faith" to be supreme of priest and bishop, the events which 
had occurred seemed only to have inflamed his desire for power 
and glory. 

The destruction of monasteries was rapidly advancing, and 
the rents and riches of the religious houses bulked out an end- 
less heap of wealth. 

Meanwhile the Lady Jane led a quiet life ; but it was the life 
of a slave. She had before her the fate of Catherine and the 
fate of Anne, and a constant fear was on her ; she knew not 
how soon the monarch might become the murderer. She 
feared his glance ; she was cold, solemn, reserved to all, sub- 
mitted to his wishes in every particular, and knew no will but 
his. Henry was attentive and kind, but he had not for her 
the same deep love that he had for Anne. She was raised to 
a high pinnacle of power, but she felt that she was but the wife 



JANE SEYMOUR. 183 

of the king, and not Queen Jane. She exerted no aathority. 
Unlike Queen AnnCj the sceptre was to her an idle bauble. 
There is but one instance of her employing her regal power, 
and this was to bestow upon some kind friend, a buck from 
the royal forest. 

At length an event of an important nature took place at 
Hampton Court. This was the birth of a prince. For weeks 
the king had resided at the palace, fearing that his absence 
might be the occasion of any concern to the queen, and when 
it was announced to him that a prince was born, his joy knew 
no bounds. There were strange rumours at the time, which 
have since been reissued again and again as historical facts 
about the birth of Prince Edward, It was said that one of the 
attendants repaired to the monarch, and stated that it would be 
impossible to save the lives of both the queen and the prince, 
that one must be sacrificed for the preservation of the other, 
and that in reply the king cried, '* Save the child ; queens are 
plentiful enough !" The story is related in a " woful ballad" of 
the period. 

*' A lady to him did repair, 
And said ' king shew us thy will, 
The queen's sweet life to save or spill ;' 
'Then, as you can't save both,' said he, 
' O save the flower and not the tree,' 
' O mourn, mourn, mourn fair ladies, 
Your queen, the flower of England's dead !" 

But alas for courtly gossip, and "woful ballads," there ap- 
pears to be no truth in the story. The queen did not die for 
nearly a fortnight after the birth of the prince. Her death 
was caused by over excitement and over exertion. The joy 
of the king^'could not be restrained, and the palace became a 



184 JANE SEYMOUR. 

constant scene of revelry. The queen's chamber became a 
very room of state reception, and lords and ladies flocked 
thither to do honour to the queen and the young prince. The 
christening was on the grandest and most extensive scale. 
Processions of solemn grandeur were made from the queen's 
chamber to the chapel, and from the chapel to the queen's 
chamber, at which the chroniclers tell us loud fanfares were 
sounded upon trumpets without the door, fanfares which made 
the very rafters ring. The queen was laid upon a couch of 
golden cloth, to receive the child after it had been christened, 
by the name of Edward, and to bestow upon it the maternal 
blessing ; and all this splendid etiquette was too much for the 
poor queen. The day after the ceremony she became alarm- 
ingly ill — delirium came on — and at last she died, and the 
monarch was again a widower. 

She was buried with great pomp, and a curious epitaph was 
written ; — 

" Here a phoenix lieth, whose death 
To another phoenix gave birth : 
It is to be lamented much, 
The world at once ne'er knew two sueh." 



MRS. PIOZZI. 



There is sufficient personal interest in the life ofMrs.Piozzi 
to render her history worthy of perusal. She possessed merit 
enough to commend herself to posterity. But independently 
of this, her name, character, and fortune, are so intimately 
connected with the literary world of her period, that on this 
account the story of her life becomes doubly interesting. She 
was born in 1740, and was the daughter of John Salusbury, 
Esq., of Bodville, in Caernarvonshire. Under the learned 
Dr. Collyer, she received an excellent classical education. 
Hebrew, Greek, and Latin, were among her acquisitions in 
this department. In every branch of learning she made ex- 
tensive advances, and it was this that in after years so com- 
mended her to the great elephantine LL.D., Samuel Johnson, 

In her twenty-fourth year. Miss Salusbury married Henry 
Thrale, Esq., an eminent brewer, in Southwark, and a man 
of education and talent. He was acquainted with the well- 
known critic and dramatist, Arthur Murphy, by whom he was 
introduced, soon after his marriage, to Dr. Samuel Johnson, 
then in the full blow of his fame. The decided literary 
tastes, both of Mr. and Mrs. Thrale, led to a mutual attrac- 
tion between them and Dr. Johnson, and he was their frequent 
guest from the first hour of their acquaintance. Ere long, 
the connexion grew closer, Johnson being invited in 1766, to 
take up his residence with them at Streatham altogether — an 
invitation which he willingly accepted. Boswell represents 
this as a happy event for the great lexicographer. *' He had 

R 2 



l86 MRS. PIOZZI. 

at Mr. Thrale's all the comforts and luxuries of life ; his 
melancholy was diverted, and his irregular habits lessened, by 
association with an agreeable and well-ordered family." 

Thus we think of Johnson : — huge, burly, stout-hearted, 
clear-headed, independent, upright, prejudiced, rough and 
ready Johnson ; settling every argument as with sledge-ham- 
mer force ; making- his "Sir" more powerful than a syllo- 
gism, speaking in that peculiar dialect of his which made 
Goldsmith say that if ever Johnson wrote a fable about little 
fishes, he would make the little fishes talk like whales. For 
fifteen years Johnson resided with the Thrales, with mutual 
satisfaction to the guest and entertainers. For Mr. Thrale, 
even leonine Johnson entertained a deep respect, and his 
presence always kept the doctor in check, but when after the 
death of Mr. Thrale the doctor continued to reside with the 
widow, the case was altered. He now attempted to rule the 
house, and his bearish rudeness was insupportable. As an 
illustration of this, Mrs. Thrale relates in her "Anecdotes," 
that one day two quiet respectable gentlemen came to dine 
with her at Streatham ; one of them, a Quaker, chanced to 
tell an anecdote respecting the red-hot balls thrown at the siege 
of Gibraltar, which had just taken place. When he had done, 
" I would advise you, sir," said Johnson, with a cold sneer, 
" never to relate this story again. You can scarce imagine 
how very poor a figure you make in the telling of it." The 
abashed and unassuming Quaker never again ventured to open 
his mouth but in a whisper throughout the evening, and even 
then, he spoke only to his friend who had come with him. 
When the two visitors departed, and Johnson was left alone 
with Mrs. Thrale, " I did not quarrel with those fellows," said 
he, with a satisfied sense of his own forbearance. " They 
gave you no cause of offence," replied Mrs. Thrale. " No 



MRS. PIOZZI. 187 

offence !" returned the doctor, with an altered voice ; "and 
is it nothing to sit whispering together when I am present, 
without even directing their discourse towards me, or offering 
me a share in the conversation ?" 

At the sale of Mr. Thrale's property, for Johnson was ap- 
pointed one of the executors, he was seen bustling about with 
an inkhorn in his button-hole, like an exciseman. On being 
asked what he supposed to be the value of the properly to be 
disposed of, he answered with his usual pomp, " Sir, we are 
not here to-day to sell vats and boilers, but to study the 
potentiality of growing rich beyond the dreams of avarice." 

The story of the Quaker is a sufficient illustration of the 
manner in which Johnson conducted himself. He was the 
heau ideal of Captain Absolute. The connexion which the 
doctor had maintained for so lengthened a period, could not 
endure long after Mr. Thrale's death. To the honour of Mrs. 
Thrale, however, be it spoken, she did not hurriedly or rudely 
part with a man possessed of virtues so great and numerous, 
and so far transcending, on the whole, his failings. Three 
years after the death of her husband, she went to Bath, for the 
advantage, partly, of her health, and partly that she might be 
for a time freed from the yoke which had become so heavy. 
At Bath she met a music-master, named Piozzi, an Italian by 
birth, and a man of respectability, though not the equal, cer- 
tainly, in fortune, or station, of herself. However, she mar- 
ried him, and Johnson and she parted for ever. The fact of 
Piozzi being a foreigner and a musician, as well as the con- 
sciousness, no doubt, of the altered position in which the mar- 
riage would place himself with respect to the Thrale family — 
all this conspired to make the match odious to the doctor, and 
some have asserted (what others deny), that in a letter to 
herself, he called it a " most ignominious business." But the 



188 MRS. PIOZZI. 

lady's mind was made up. Johnson took leave of her mildly, 
and, indeed, afFectingly, after all was concluded. "What you 
have done," he said, " however I may lament it, I have no 
pretence to resent, as it has not been injurious to me ; I 
therefore breathe out one sigh more of tenderness, perhaps 
useless, but at least sincere. I wish that God may grant 
you every blessing." 

After all, the doctor was a sincere man ; not a sugar-plum 
mortal ; not one who alone could dwell in scented rooms and 
wash his hands in rose-water; not one who "prophesied 
smooth things ;" butwho was honest, thoroughly true, in whom 
there was no cant. 

Mrs. Thrale was already known to fame. She had written 
much, and she had written well. In those days literary circles 
abounded with a host of wit-mongers, like gnats in the sun- 
shine. These immediately began to exert themselves to utter 
sharp things about Mrs. Thrale becoming Mrs. Piozzi. There 
was certainly nothing very wonderful in the re-marriage of a 
woman of forty, even with a person a little below her in rank. 
Peter Pindar treats this marriage-matter in a very humorous 
way, in his piece called "Bozzy and Piozzi," where he paints a 
contention between James Boswell and the lady, as rival can- 
didates for the honour of biographising Dr. Johnson. The 
lady is made to defend her escape from widowhood thus em- 
phatically : — 



What was my marriage, sir, to you, or him ? 
He tell me what to do ! a pretty whim ! 
He to propriety (the beast !) exhort I 
As well might elephants preside at court ! 
****** 

Tell me, James Boswell, what's the world to me ? 



MRS. PIOZZI. 189 

The folks who paid respects to Mrs. Thrale, 
Fed on her pork, poor souls ! and swilled her ale, 
May sicken at Piozzi ; nine in ten 
Turn up the nose of scorn ; — what then ? 
They keep their company, and I my meat. 

It was true, as the satirist hints, that the world, guided or 
biassed by regard for Johnson, did very generally condemn 
the match. Mrs. Piozzi freed herself from their immediate 
sneers, by going abroad with her husband. At the close of 
1784, they visited France, and subsequently passed through 
Germany and Italy. They settled ultimately, for a time, at 
Florence. Here Mrs. Piozzi's fixed literary tastes led to the 
congregation of a congenial knot of English gentlemen and 
ladies, who, chiefly for their own amusement, published a 
volume, called the " Florence Miscellany," to which they all 
contributed. Mrs. Piozzi was a leader in the business, and 
many pieces, of no slight merit, appeared at this time from 
her pen. One in particular may be adverted to, as worthy of 
notice, namely, the '* Three Warnings," a pointed allegorical 
piece, which has found a place in almost all subsequent collec- 
tions of poetry. The contributions to this miscellany consti- 
tuted Mrs. Piozzi's first appearance in print. She had for a 
coadjutor at Florence, the famous Delia Crusca (Mr. Merry), 
"on whose coming over to England," says Mr. GifFord, "a 
poetical amatory fever spread through the land, and its perio- 
dicals — Laura, Maria, Carlos, Orlando, Adelaide, and a thou- 
sand other nameless names, caught the infection ; and from 
one end of the kingdom to the other, all was nonsense and 
Delia Crusca." Mrs. Piozzi was of a grade superior to these 
scirbblers, and ought never to have been accounted of their 
number. 

No one who has ever read the works of Mrs, Piozzi can 



190 MRS. PIOZ^I. 

doubt her talent. Here we do not so much speak of her 
prose compositions, as her poetical genius. Her poem enti- 
tled, " Duty and Pleasure," is a master-piece : — 

" Duty and Pleasure long at strife, 
Met in the common walks of life. 

* Pray don't disturb me — get you gone !' 
Cries Duty in a serious tone. 

Then with a smile, ' Keep off, my dear, 
Nor force me to be thus severe.' 

* Dear sir,' cries Pleasure, ' you're so grave ; 
You make yourself a perfect slave. 

I can't think why we disagree : 
You may turn Methodist for me. 
But if you'll neither laugh nor play. 
At least don't stop me in my way. 
Yet sure one moment you may steal, 
To see the lovely Miss O'Neill. 
One hour to relaxation give : 

lend one hour from life to live ! 

And here's a bird and there's a flower — 
Dear Duty, walk a little slower !' 

* My morning's task is not half done,' 
Cries Duty, with an inward groan ; 

' False colours on each object spread ; 

1 know not where or how I'm led : 

Your bragg'd enjoyments mount the wind, 
And leave their venom' d stings behind. 
"Where are you flown ?'— Voices around 
Cry, ' Pleasure long hath left the ground.' 
Old age advances ; haste away, 
Nor lose the light of parting day ! 
See sickness follows, sorrow threats ; 
Waste no more time in vain regrets. 
Oh, Duty ! one more eff()rt given, 
May reach, perhaps, the gates of Heaven, 
Where only, each with each delighted, 
Pleasure and duty live united." 



MRS. PIOZZI. 191 

After visiting every part of Italy, Mrs. Piozzi returned with 
her husband to England. In a fanciful moment, she imitated 
Dean Swift, by composing some light verses at Dover, of 
which the merit is the rhyming. They run thus : — 

" He whom fan- winds have wafted over, 
First hails his native land at Dover, 
And doubts not but he shall discover 
Pleasure in every path round Dover ; 
Envies the happy crows which hover 
About old Shakespeare's cliff at Dover; 
From this fond dream he'll soon recover, 
When debts shall drive him back to Dover ; 
Hopipg, though poor, to live in clover, 
Once safely past the straits at Dover ;" &c. 

Mrs. Piozzi was a shrewd observer of nature. Her pictures 
from Italy became deservedly popular. Books of travels 
have always been rather overdone, and the two volumes of 
journeying obtained no permanent place in English literature. 
"We do not always want to know how authors felt when 
they first saw the Prado, or first walked the Rialto ; or how 
they were stricken with astonishment at St. Peters, or grew 
poetical or sentimental on the canals of Venice. We have 
heard these things again and again, and without there is some 
novelty in the telling, theyb ecome rather tasteless and unin- 
teresting. Another work of Mrs. Piozzi's was and is a great 
favourite. A recent writer says : — 

" In 1787, Mrs. Piozzi published her well-known volume 
of 'Anecdotes of Dr. Johnson.' The great interest of the 
subject would alone have made this book a favourite, but the 
authoress ought not to be deprived of the share of merit justly 
due to her, as a narrator of much acuteness of observation 
and liveliness of fancy. Smarting as she then was under the 



192 MRS. PIOZZI. 

neglect which Johnson's open disapproval of her marriage had 
hrought upon her from the circles in which she had previously 
shone, it is scarcely to be wondered at that she should have 
allowed the shades of her former friend's character to come 
out pretty broadly on her canvass ; but we believe she cannot 
be proved to have told any untruths, and she over and over 
again admits the greatness of his virtues. In the year 1778, 
she published a second work relating to Johnson, being a 
series of Letters which had passed between herself and him. 
These are very interesting ; and had not Boswell's unique 
production given us a view so wonderfully minute of the 
doctor's character, would have been held as a most important 
contribution to literary history. Boswell, however, super- 
seded and threw into the shade all other works upon the 
subject of which he treated. But Mrs. Piozzi has still the 
merit of having produced a pleasing record of many incidents 
in the life of a remarkable man." 

In 1794, Mrs. Piozzi published a work entitled, " British 
Synonyms ; or an attempt to regulate the choice of words in 
familiar conversation." Upon this work a very bitter criti- 
cism was passed by Gifford, harsher than justice called for, 
though withal, the title of the book was high-sounding, and 
the attempt beyond the power of our authoress. Her volume 
on " Retrospection, or a review of the most striking events of 
the last eighteen hundred years," succeeded far better. 

She lost her second husband in 1809, and from that period 
to the close of her life, in 1823, resided chiefly at Clifton. 



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THE COUNTESS OF COTENTEY. 



To their praise be it spoken, the English nobility have a 
higher and better claim upon the homage and respect of the 
people than that which rank can give. Honour to whom 
honour is due. We are not of the number of those who 
would decry all that is connected with aristocracy. There is 
a class to whom the very name of peer is but the synonym for 
something which calls for reproach. We are proud of our 
nobility. We acknowledge it without shame. We are no 
despisers of posthumous honours, and we can do honour to 
the posterity of those whose wisdom and valour have made 
our country what it is. 

But with the majority in this country there exists a prestige 
in favour of rank which no amount of theoretical democracy 
has been able to destroy. Of old the followers of Longbeard 
cried, " No haughty lords," and chanted in Wat Tyler's riot, 

" When Adam delved, and Eve span, 
Who was then the gentleman ?" 

Burns may tell us — 

" The rank is but the guinea stamp, 
A man's a man for a' that :" 

Still, the truth is, we respect rank. And such respect is not 
a senseless thing. " Rank represents ancient institutions. 



194 THE COUNTESS OF COVENTRY. 

It is redolent of deeds deemed noble at the time of doing, 
however contrary to the advanced public opinion of our day. 
It tracks its origin to heroes. It preserves the idea of 
honour. By means of it national identity is kept alive. Our 
titles are rich in meaning. Apsley House and Blenheim 
speak volumes." 

We have small patience with the bickerings of those who 
would look upon our titled aristocracy as a dead weight on the 
community. Wealth and rank are powerful instruments for 
good, and, when rightly employed, are of the utmost utility. 
In the Countess of Coventry none could recognise aught but 
what would dignify and elevate human character in any 
situation of life. To her it might have been said in the words 
of Coleridge — 

" Oh, lady, nursed in pomp and pleasure, 
Where learnt you that heroic measure?" 

For she was ever the friend of the friendless, exerting her 
energies for the practical good of those about her, and if 



<( > 



Tis noble only to be good," 



the Countess of Coventry would still hold a high degree in 
the aristocracy of benevolence and virtue. 

But except to her own immediate friends, the record of her 
life would be uninteresting. The lives of those who exert the 
influence of a good example, and who bow to the high behests 
of love to God and man, do not, in the majority of instances, 
make the most amusing and attractive biographies. Yet a 
life well-spent is better than a life spent in intense excitement. 
The silent workers of the world are some of its noblest reno- 
vators. What we need is not so much an accession to the 
mighty ones whose light and lightning rejoice or alarm the 



THE COUNTESS OF COVENTRY. 195 

world, but what we need in cottage homes and under palace 
roofs, is the recognition of those principles which elevate all 
who receive them, and the practical application of those 
principles to the affairs of common life. And happy is it to 
find the high and noble, they who wear the ermine and the 
coronet, actuated by those rules of life, and learning the deep 
and solemn lesson, that high and low, rich and poor, the rude 
and most refined, should bear each other's burden, and strive 
to bring about the glorious advent of the golden future that 
must come at last. 

Born of a noble and ancient family, the Countess of 
Coventry was endowed with all that could make life happy. 
Beautiful in person, intelligent in understanding, and posses- 
sing high-toned virtue, she mingled with the great ones of the 
world as an elevating power. Receiving an education befit- 
ting her rank, her mind was easily enriched with all that was 
calculated to form and dignify her character. And the 
instruction she received was well repaid. Her friends loved, 
honoured, and admired her, and of foes she had none. Many 
a grateful heart blesses her name, though, perchance, when 
the good deed, so well remembered, so fondly cherished, was 
done, the giver was a stranger to those whom she relieved, 
and who only afterwards learned to recognize in their 
benefactress and their friend, the Countess of Coventry. 



CHARLOTTE SMITH. 



The name of this talented and unfortunate lady is well 
known ; and in visiting Stoke one cannot look upon her neat 
monument executed by Bacon without melancholy reflections. 
The story of her life possesses painful interest, and her devo- 
tion to literature throughout many years of trial and sorrow 
cannot be read without feelings of emotion. 

She was born on the fourth of May, 1749, and was the 
eldest daughter of Nicholas Turner, Esq., of Stoke House^ 
in Surrey. 

Her faculties were of so lively a nature that she learned to 
read at a period earlier than she could afterwards remember, 
and was taught to dance when so mere a baby, that she re- 
ceived her firibt steps upon a dining-room table. While still 
at the boarding-school, her conversation was remarkable for 
intelligence, wit, and imagination ; while she excelled all her 
companions at once in music, in drawing, and in dancing. 
She also distinguished herself at this early period by her per- 
formances in some private theatricals got up at school, and 
by writing verses. It would appear, however, that her edu- 
cation was of a superficial kind, and that the formation of her 
character and habits was in some measure injured by the in- 
dulgence in whicli she was reared by an aunt, to whose charge 
she had been chiefly entrusted after the early loss of her 
mother. At twelve she was introduced to the gaieties of 
fashionable life in the metropolis, and allowed to enter much 
too freely into them ; by which she was less prepared than 



CHARLOTTE SMITH. 197 

she might have been for the sad reverses and distresses which 
clouded her latter years. 

The " world," as it is sometimes called, is not the best 
place for the formation of habits of prudence and virtue. Routs, 
and balls, and plays, and masquerades are not scenes the best 
calculated for reflection and study ; and when, as in Miss 
Turner's case, a liveliness of disposition, a keen wit, and a 
beautiful face and figure, are the portion of the debutante^ 
great risk is run, and it requires skilful pilotage to escape the 
shoals and quicksands, which, though hidden, lie in dangerous 
proximity. 

When Miss Turner was not more than fifteen, her aunt 
begun to make serious attempts to hurry her into a matrimo- 
nial engagement. She did it for the best. Mr. Turner had 
resolved upon a second marriage. The aunt trembled for the 
comfort of her niece, when a new wife and mother should be 
brought home to the hitherto happy mansion. 

The gentleman selected for Miss Turner, was a Mr. Smith, 
son of a West India merchant in the city, who had taken him 
into partnership. He was brought into Miss Turner's society 
for the express purpose of forming an attachment to her, and 
the event justified the expectations which had been formed. 
On the other hand, it was no difficult matter to talk the young 
lady into a reciprocal feeling. Too young to be able to judge 
for herself respecting either her own afi'ections, or the charac- 
ter of her suitor, she was hurried by injudicious friends into 
an union with one who was destined to prove the bane of her 
happiness. The marriage took place in February, 1765, 
v/hile the subject of our memoir as yet wanted three months 
to complete her sixteenth year. 

It was the beginning of sorrows. Love is proverbially 

blind :— 

" Thou art all beauty, or all blindness I !" 

s s 2 



198 CHARLOTTE SMITH. 

is the language of the lover ; but marriage performs miracles, 
and the blind receive their sight. When it was too late the 
young wife found out the error of the step she had taken. 
Young, gay, and inexperienced, she was placed in apartments 
connected with the mercantile establishment of her husband, 
in one of the narrowest and darkest lanes of the city. There, 
amidst other annoyances, to which as heretofore she had been 
a stranger, she was exposed to the illiberal remarks of a father- 
in-law and mother- in-law, whose ideas were of an entirely diffe- 
rent character from her own. From the account furnished by 
her sister, we are made acquainted with the facts of the case. 
Old Mr. Smith usually took his chocolate in his daughter-in- 
law's dressing-room, and his approach was the signal for hur- 
rying away every trace of elegant study, and the dismissal of 
every congenial visitor. The old lady at the same time ex- 
acted an almost constant attendance on account of her health, 
and made use of the opportunities thus obtained to lecture the 
young wife upon household maxims in the highest degree re- 
pugnant to her. It was like immuring an antelope in a stable. 
Nothing can be more clear than that the introduction of a 
being constituted and educated as she was, into a scene like 
what has been described, was calculated to occasion distress 
both to herself and to others. Her own low health, and the 
loss of her first child by a malignant illness, led to her being 
removed to a country lodging, where she was more at her own 
disposal, and had leisure to pursue the studies in which she 
delighted. Yet every advance which her mind made towards 
maturity only enabled her to feel more acutely the irrecon- 
cileable difference between her own character and those of her 
new friends, more especially of her husband, who speedily 
proved to be a frivolous and fickle young man, unfit for either 
business or society. To use her own emphatic words, " The 




CHARLOTTE SMITH. 199 

move I cultivated and improved my understanding, the more 
clearly I saw the horror of the abyss into which I had uncon- 
sciously plunged." But it is to be related to her honour, that, 
while suffering deeply under a growing sense of this great and 
irremediable calamity, she never suffered a complaint to escape 
her lips, even in the presence of her most confidential friends. 

Her husband w^as a gay and dissipated character, ruining 
both his health and prospects, by his careless and extravagant 
course of conduct. At length, the time which he could not be 
prevailed upon to bestow upon business, being chiefly spent 
in costly follies, she, in 1774, prevailed upon her father-in-law 
to allow of his retiring with his family to a small estate called 
Lys Farm, in Hampshire, where she hoped by having him con- 
stantly under her eye, to check his extravagant course. This 
laudable desire met with the approval of her father-in-law, 
but the old gentleman parted v/ith her with extreme regret, 
for he had found more benefit from her occasional services 
in the business than he had ever experienced from those of 
his son. So sensible was he of her usefulness and dexterity, 
as to offer her a fixed allowance if she tvould remain. But 
she steadily maintained the course she had proposed. Two 
years passed away, when the death of the elder Mr. Smith 
occasioned a considerable alteration in their fortunes. He 
died leaving a large property confusedly distributed by a will 
of his own composition, amongst his numerous descendants ; a 
will which was speedily torn to pieces amidst legal contentions. 

While the will case was going on in the law courts, Mr. Smith 
was enabled by a lucrative contract with government, to realize 
a considerable income. But his old habits of prodigality were 
too firmly rooted to be easily destroyed, and at last he had to 
exchange the brilliant theatre and the gay saloon, for the cold, 
dark, dreary prison-house, and the society of the witty and 



200 CHARLOTTE SMITH. 

intelligent, of the rich and the powerful, for that of the broken- 
hearted debtors, iro mured within Newgate walls. 

The conduct of Mrs. Smith was never so deserving of admi- 
ration as at this time. When suffering from the calamities which 
her husband had brought on himself, and in which he had in- 
extricably involved her and her children, she made herself the 
companion of his confinement, amidst scenes of vice, of misery, 
and even of terror — for, while she was in prison, two attempts 
were made by the inmates to obtain their liberation by blowing 
up the walls of the house. Throughout one of the nights ap- 
pointed for this dreadful enterprise, she remained at a window, 
dressed, and expecting every moment to witness contention 
and bloodshed, and perhaps to be overwhelmed by the projected 
explosion. She also made herself mistress of her husband's 
affairs, and submitted to many humiliating applications on his 
behalf, by which her best feelings were occasionally outraged. 
Perhaps the severest of her trials was the necessity of employ- 
ing her superior abilities in defending a conduct she could not 
approve of. At the end of seven months, by a resignation of 
his property into the hands of trustees, she had the satisfaction 
of procuring her husband's liberation, and accompanying hira 
to a house in Sussex, where her children had for some time 
remained, under the care of their maternal uncle. " After 
such scenes and such apprehensions," says she, in reference 
to the dangers she encountered in prison, " how deliciously 
soothing to my wearied spirits was the soft pure air of the 
summer's morning, breathing over the dewy grass, as (having 
slept one night upon the road) we passed over the heaths of 
Surrey ! My native hills at length burst upon my view. I 
beheld once more the fields where I passed my happiest days, 
and, amidst the perfumed turf with which one of those fields 
was strewn, perceived with delight the beloved group from 



CHARLOTTE SMITH. 201 

whom I had been so long divided, and for whose fate ray affec- 
tions were ever anxious. The transports of this meeting were 
too much for my exhausted spirits. After all my sufferings, 
I began to hope that I might taste content, or experience at 
least a respite from calamity." 

It had been some relief to her during the many sorrowful 
years which she had passed since her marriage, to soothe her 
feelings by the composition of sonnets. She did not write 
for applause. They were not the tinselled sentimentality of 
the would-be poetess — they were the natural utterance of an 
overburdened heart. These sonnets were sacred things. She 
had never shown them to her friends, but now that poverty 
was pressing hard upon herself and husband, she mentioned 
these sonnets, and allowed them to be published. They formed 
a thin quarto volume, and the mild tenderness which they 
breathed procured them admiration in the literary world. 
They were so natural, so easy, so unconstrained, so truthful, 
that they awakened sympathy in the breasts of those who read 
them. They were established favourites at once. 

A short time after the publication of this work, she retired, 
with her husband and family, to an ancient chateau in Nor- 
mandy, and while in this seclusion, amused her leisure by 
translating a French novel into English. Cadell the publisher 
issued this book in 1785, but it did not add to the reputation 
of the translator. They had retired to France with the idea 
that there stricter economy could be observed than in England, 
and that they would be better able to live upon their scanty 
means. Two years satisfied them that this was a mistake, so 
they returned to England, and took up their residence at 
Woolbeding House, Midhurst. Their eldest surviving son 
was also fortunate enough to obtain a writership in Bengal. 

An increasing incompatibility of temper now determined 



202 CHARLOTTE SMITH. 

Charlotte Smith upon a step which she had better have taken 
many years before — a separation from her husband. This 
she unfortunately eiFected without terms respecting her own 
fortune, but was accompanied by the whole of her children. 
A small house in the neighbourhood of Chichester now became 
her home, and then began her true literary history — she had 
resolved to trust to her pen for the support of herself and her 
children. 

Mrs. Dormer says with respect to her, during this period 
of her life : — " Those who have formed their ideas of her from 
her works, and even from what she says, in her moments of 
despondency, of herself, have naturally concluded that she 
was of a melancholy disposition ; but nothing could be more 
erroneous. Cheerfulness and gaiety were the natural charac- 
teristics of her mind ; and though circumstances of the most 
depressing nature at times weighed down her spirit to the 
earth, yet such was its buoyancy, that it quickly returned to 
its level. 

" Notwithstanding her constant literary occupations, she 
never adopted the aflPectations, the inflated language, and exag- 
gerated expressions, which literary ladies are often distinguished 
by, but always expressed herself with the utmost simplicity. 
She composed with greater facility than others could transcribe, 
and never would avail herself of an amanuensis, always 
asserting that it was more trouble to find them in comprehen- 
sion than to execute the business herself ; in fact, the quick- 
ness of her conception was such, that she made no allowance 
for the slower faculties of others, and her impetuosity seldom 
allowed her time to explain herself with the precision required 
by less ardent minds. This hastiness of temper was one of 
the greatest shades in her character, and one of her greatest 
misfortunes. 



CHARLOTTE SMITH. 203 

** She was always the friend of the unfortunate, and spared 
neither her time, her talents, nor even her purse, in the cause 
of those she endeavoured to serve ; and with a heart so warm, 
it may easily be believed, she was frequently the dupe of her 
benevolence. The poor always found in her a kind protectress, 
and she never left any place of residence without bearing with 
her their prayers and regrets. 

" No woman had greater trials as a wife ; very few could 
have acquitted themselves so well. But her conduct for 
twenty-three years speaks for itself. She was a most tender 
and anxious mother, and if she carried her indulgence to her 
children too far, it is an error too general to be very severely 
reprobated. To shield them as much as possible from the 
mortifying consequences of loss of fortune, was the object of 
her indefatigable exertions. Her reward was in their affection 
and gratitude, and in the approval of her own heart." 

Soon after the separation, Mr. Smith, finding himself 
involved in fresh difficulties, retired again to the continent, 
but not without making strenuous efforts to be re-united to 
his wife. Sometimes, indeed, they met, and always cordially, 
but the authoress found it better to maintain herself and 
children by indefatigable industry, than share the hazardous 
and wretched life to which she had so long been condemned. 
She constantly corresponded with her husband, and endea- 
voured to render him every assistance in bringing the family 
affairs to an issue, but they never afterwards resided together. 

The period ?.t which Mrs. Smith wrote was not a reading 
age. The schoolmaster was not abroad. Cheap books and 
pamphlets were not pouring forth incessantly from an ever- 
teeming press. Huge placards of forthcoming publications 
did not catch the eye from afar. The might of the press was 
not thoroughly understood, and though great books were 



204 CHARLOTTE SMITH. 

written and appreciated, it was a different class, that reading 
public, than that which bears the name now-a-days. Yet the 
works of Charlotte Smith were favourably received, and as 
novel after novel added to her fame, the profits enabled her to 
maintain a respectable standing in the world. All labour is 
honourable. Brow-sweat and brain-sweat are not to be 
despised. In every department of society they are the most 
honourable who earn their own living by their ov/n labour. 

The summer of 1787, saw Mrs. Smith established in a 
cottage at Wyke, pursuing her literary occupations with much 
assiduity and delight, and supplying to her children the 
duties of both parents. Here she began and completed, in 
the short space of eight months, her first and perhaps most 
pleasing novel of " Emmeline," which was published in 1788, 
and met with brilliant success. The first edition of fifteen 
hundred sold so rapidly that a second was immediately called 
for ; and Mr. Cadell found his profits so considerable, that he 
had the liberality, voluntarily, to augment the price he had 
agreed to give for it. The continued success of her volume of 
sonnets was equally gratifying, and, exclusive of profit and 
reputation, procured her many valuable friends and estimable 
acquaintances, and some in the most exalted ranks in life ; and 
it was not the least pleasing circumstance to a mother's heart, 
that her son in Bengal owed his promotion in the civil service 
to her talents. 

"Etheliride," " Celestina," *' Desmond," and "The Old 
English Manor House," were other novels published in suc- 
cession by Mrs. Smith, and all of which, but particularly the 
last, were well received by the public. They display great 
inventive powers, great knowledge of the human bosom, very 
high powers of natural description, and a singular combination 
of wit and satire, with that delicacy and pathos in which the 



CHARLOTTE SMITH. 205 

female pen so often excels. *' Desmond " has the peculiarity 
of being tinged with the notions of the French revolutionists, 
which she had contracted from some accidental friendships, 
and was the more disposed to entertain through that bitterness 
against all fortunate things and persons which the unhappy 
spirit is but too readily disposed to cherish. This circum- 
stance lost her some of her exalted friends, and contributed 
additional distress to a mind already sufficiently afflicted. 
In 1793, her third son, who was serving as an ensign in the 
14th regiment of infantry, lost his leg at Dunkirk, and her 
own health began to sink under the pressure of so many 
afflictions, and the continual harassing circumstances in which 
the family property was involved, in the arrangement of which 
her exertions were incessant. She removed to Bath, but 
received no benefit from the use of the waters. An attack of 
the gout had fixed itself on her hands, probably increased by 
the constant use of the pen, which nevertheless she continued 
to employ, though some of her fingers were become contracted. 
Her second daughter had been married to a gentleman of 
Normandy, who had emigrated at the beginning of the "Revo- 
lution. This young lady fell into a decline after her first 
confinement, and died at Clifton in the spring of 1794, It 
would be impossible to describe an affliction which mothers 
only can either experience or comprehend. From this time 
she became more than ever unsettled, moving from place to 
place in search of that tranquillity she was not destined ever 
to enjoy, yet continuing her literary occupation with astonishing 
application. 

Her life was one of trouble and anxiety. Happiness was 
the spirit that ever hovered before her and yet eluded her 
grasp. The life of man is a search after happiness. And, 
with regard to many the Persian epitome of universal history 

T 



206 



CHARLOTTE-^ SMITH. 



applies ; — they were born, they were wretched, they died ! 
Yet we are, in most cases, the makers of our own happiness 
or misery. We do not sufficiently study tlie consequences of 
our conduct. But every thing has its results. We despise 
trifles, but trifles are the turning points of our existence, and, 
viewed in all its relations, a trifle becomes a most momentous 
matter. Some of those events which must necessarily involve 
important consequences, are not sufficiently regarded with 
serious interest. There is no relation by which so much is 
compromised as that of man and wife. Marriage, imprudently 
contracted, embitters a whole life. It was so in the case of 
Charlotte Smith : and it is so in the case of thousands. The 
match, so easily formed, was the beginning of her misery — 
the evils consequent thereupon were with her to her dying 
day. 

The end of her life was harassed by long delay in the settle- 
ment of the property, " which," says her sister and biographer, 
" was equally embarrassing to all parties, and at length in- 
duced one of them to propose a compromise ; so that by the 
assistance of a noble friend, an adjustment of the respective 
claims was eff'ected, but not without considerable loss on all 
sides. Still she derived great satisfaction that her family 
would be relieved from the difficulties she had so long con- 
tended with, although she was personally but little benefited 
l)y it. So many years of mental anxiety and exertion had 
completely undermined a constitution, which nature seemed 
to have formed to endure unimpaired to old age ; and con- 
vinced that her exhausted frame was sinking under increasing 
infirmity, she determined on removing into Surrey, from a 
desire that her mortal remains might be laid with those of her 
mother, and many of her father's family, in Stoke Churchy 
near Guildford. In 1803, she removed from Frans, near 



CHARLOTTE SMITH. 207 

Tunbridge, to the village of Elsted, in the neighbourhood of 
Godalraing. In the winter of 1804, I spent some time with 
her, when she was occupied in composing her charming little 
work for the use of young persons, entitled * Conversations,' 
which she occasionally wrote in the common sitting-room of 
the family, with two or three lively grandchildren playing 
about her, and conversing with great cheerfulness and plea- 
sure, though nearly confined to her sofa, in great bodily pain, 
and in a mortifying state of dependence on the services of 
others, but in the full possession of all her faculties ; a bless- 
ing of which she was most justly sensible, and for which she 
frequently expressed her gratitude to the Almighty, 

" In the following year she removed to Tilford,near Farnham, 
where her long sufferings were finally closed, on the 28th of 
October 1806, in her 58th year. Mr. Smith's death took 
place the preceding March. She was buried at Stoke, in 
compliance with her wishes, where a neat monument, exe- 
cuted by Bacon, is erected to her memory, and that of two of 
her sons, Charles and George, both of whom perished in the 
West Indies, in the service of their country. It is impossible, 
in concluding the melancholy retrospection of a life so pecu- 
liarly and so invariably marked by adversity, not to express 
the keenest regret, that a being with a mind so highly gifted, 
a heart so alive to every warm and generous feeling, with 
beauty to delight, and virtues to attach all hearts, so formed 
herself for happiness, and so eminently qualified to dispense 
it to others, should have been, from her early youth, the de- 
voted victim of folly, vice, and injustice." 



QUEEN CAROLINE. 



There is not a more touching episode in the annals of 
modern history, than the story of the ill-fated Queen Caroline. 
An event so well known as the trial of the queen, needs no long 
detail here. It is, comparatively speaking, but an occurrence 
of yesterday, and the echo of the shout which told of her 
acquittal has scarcely died away. 

An act of the reign of George III., rendered illegal the 
marriage of a prince of the royal blood with a British 
subject. To the sagacious law makers, it seemed a desirable 
thing to prevent all jealousy and all family feuds with regard 
to royal matrimonial alliances, by act of parliament. It 
was a harsh and wrong restriction in the eyes of many, but 
the wisdom of parliament saw nothing for the peace of 
England, nothing that could secure it from another war 
of red and white roses, but looking abroad for far-off mates 
in German principalities. The king had determined that 
his children should not marry among his subjects. Some 
said that the monarch considered it derogatory ; and others 
that this could hardly be the case, seeing that the petty 
German potentates were far inferior to the old English 
nobility ; but whatever might be the reason, whatever 
might actuate prince and peers, the law was made ; and 
badly enough it acted. 

The Prince of Wales was a young man of gaiety, 
extravagance and dissipation. He was the foremost man 
of his time, but the circle in which he figured was the giddy 



III 



QUEEN CAROLINE. 



209 



round of pleasure. Gaining, horse-racing, and still wider 
deviations from the right rule of life, marked his conduct ; 
but in the eyes of sycophant courtiers, the royal purple, 
like charity, covereth a multitude of sins ; and these 
deviations were looked upon as the mere natural embellish- 
ments of his rank and fortune. The prince was one of 
the handsorbest men in Europe, but fair exteriors are not 
the sure signs of well-regulated minds. His countenance 
was open and manly ; his figure tall and strikingly propor- 
tioned ; his address remarkable for easy elegance, and his 
whole air singularly noble. His contemporaries still describe 
him as the model of a man of fashion. 

In any other position than that which Prince George 
occupied, he must inevitably have been ruined. Gaiety, 
extravagance, and dissipation, commonly end in bankruptcy. 
Bankrupt in morals the prince was ; bankrupt in money 
he could not be, while a grateful country had the inexpressi- 
ble satisfaction of paying his bills. But of this high favour 
and noble privilege, the country at length grew weary. 
The house of parliament began to debate the matter in 
serious earnest. It was a question of pounds, shillings, 
and pence ; a solemn question at any time, but especially 
so when the mass of the people were growing weary of the 
burden, when John Bull, ever a taxed animal, was being 
pressed to the earth beneath the weight of direct and indi- 
rect taxation which he had to bear. The " first gentleman 
in Europe," the model man, who had such an irresistible way 
of tying his neckcloth, was an expensive pleasure. It was 
conceived that the most likely method of withdrawing him from 
a course, which was destroying himself and distressing the 
nation, would be to advise him to form a matrimonial 
alliance. He was to get married ; and then live happy 

T 2 



210; QUEEN CAROLINE. 

and comfortable, similar to the hero of every nursery 
story. 

But English policy had settled the question with regard 
to royal marriages. He could not marry an English subject. 
He must set his heart's affections on some foreign princess, 
on somebody, most likely, whom he had never seen, and did 
not care at all about. The main object of parliament was 
to get him married ; the main object of the prince was to get 
his debts paid. So the matter was settled. At first the 
lady upon whom the royal hand was to be bestowed, was 
Louisa of Mecklenberg, niece of the queen ; but the king 
decided for his own niece, Caroline, daughter of the Duke 
of Brunswick. For this estimable lady formed to be the life, 
grace, and ornament of polished society, the prince had no 
affection, but the law of the land was stronger than passion, 
and indifference answered the end of love. 

Lord Malmesbury was sent to conclude the match towards 
the close of 1794. The preliminaries were soon settled, but 
the negociator declared it to be his opinion that the Princess 
Caroline was an uneducated, frivolous woman — the creature of 
impulse, not pleasing in person, and careless in her dress and 
habits ; yet good-natured, and not difficult to manage, so 
that in the hands of a steady and sensible man, she would turn 
out well; but if she found in that man faults analogous to her 
own, she would fail. 

Such testimony as this could not but preposess the mind of 
the prince against the union. He felt no inclination for it. 
But the whole of the arrangements were speedily concluded, 
and Caroline left her father's house, — and left therewith all 
happiness, all joy, all peace, all comfort, entering inexperi- 
enced on a treacherous world, and committing herself to the 
kind keeping of a man who had not the smallest spark of 



QUEEN CAROLINE. 



^11 



affection for her, and was prejudiced against her before she 
cantie. Her journey to England was attended with consider- 
able trouble. Difficulties and dangers crowded her path. She 
had to leave the direct route, and, after some delay, to go 
round by Hamburgh, in order to avoid the advancing armies of 
the French. On the 5th of April, 1795, she arrived in Eng- 
land. Of ail the women in England, Lady Jersey was selected 
to meet the princess, and conduct her towards the capital. 
It was a reception full of premonition. With coolness and 
indifference the prince met her for the first time. He barely 
uttered a word, turned round and withdrew. But still the 
matrimonial engagement must be fulfilled. The nation 
expected it. There were debts unpaid, and bills discredited ; 
the prince saw but one course, and he took it, and, before 
the altar, swore to love and cherish her for whom he had 
neither respect nor affection ! 

No sooner was the marriage solemnized, than the " first 
gentleman in Europe " began to treat his newly-wedded wife 
with every slight that could be given, every outrage which 
could be offered to a delicate and sensitive woman. One 
child, the Princess Charlotte, was the fruit of this unhappy 
union ; and no sooner had the ill-fated woman given birth to 
an heir to the crown, than the " most amiable prince of his 
time," intimated to her that it was no longer his pleasure that 
they should reside together. From that moment she became 
an object of pity, but not of respect. She was insulted by her 
husband, scorned by his paramours, forsaken by false friends, 
and left to fight her own battles, without understanding the 
difficulties of her position, and destitute of the requisite 
qualities to meet them. Queen Charlotte became the partizan 
of her son ; and the king was almost the only advocate who 
stood by the unfortunate Caroline. Soon after, a separation 



212 QUEEN CAROLINE. 

took place. Says one, " Unhappy couple ! Victims of 
defective education, mismanagement, and the dangers and 
temptations of an exalted station. Surrounded by all the 
glorious things of earth : possessed of every thing virhich the 
mean man envies, and the poor man longs and struggles for, 
they were two of the most pitiable, miserable beings in the 
world." 

After the separation of Caroline from Prince George, she 
retired to the continent, and passed several years among the 
friends and associates of her former years. What occurred 
during that period is but little known ; and even that little 
has been the subject of much controversy — we shall not stop 
to detail all that has been detailed so often. While the wife of 
the prince was absent, the affections of the people centred in 
her child. The Princess Charlotte was universally beloved. 
Grown to womanhood, she became the wife of Prince Leopold 
of Saxe-Coburg, a young officer, who had won her heart's 
pure love, when attending the allied sovereigns, at the court of 
England. In her the people recognized their future queen, 
in her the nation saw its fairest and brightest hopes ; but 
hopes were blighted, and fond aifection chilled. She sought 
to be brought into the society of her mother, but this was 
sternly denied. The unhappy Caroline could but hear of her 
child's prosperity, and that child could only listen to the tale 
of her mother's adversity. In November, 1817, the princess 
was delivered of a still-born child, and she herself almost 
immediately expired. Says an eloquent writer : — " Born to 
inherit the most illustrious monarchy in the world, and united 
at an early period to the object of her choice, whose virtues 
amply justified her preference, she enjoyed — what is not always 
the privilege of that rank — the highest connubial felicity, and 
had the prospect of combining all the tranquil enjoyments of 



QUEEN CAROLINE. 213 

private life with the splendour of a royal station. Placed on 
the summit of society, to her every eye was turned — in her 
every hope was centred; and'nothing was wanting to complete 
her felicity except perpetuity. To a grandeur of mind, 
suited to her royal birth and lofty distinction, she joined an 
exquisite taste for the beauties of nature, and the charms of 
retirement, where, far from the gaze of the multitude, and the 
frivolous agitations of fashionable life, she employed her hours 
in visiting, with her distinguished consort, the cottages of the 
poor, in improving her virtues, in perfecting her reason, and 
acquiring the knowledge best adapted to qualify her for the 
possession of power and the cares of empire. One thing only 
was wanting to render our satisfaction complete in the prospect 
of the accession of such a princess — it was that she might 
become the living mother of children. * * * * But alas ! 
what do we now behold but the funeral pall and shroud ; a 
palace in mourning, a nation in tears, and the shadow of death 
settled over both like a cloud !" 

Never, perhaps, did the death of a human being produce so 
deep, so universal a sensation. From the princess the eyes 
of the nation were turned towards the unhappy Caroline ; and 
the interest which was thus re- awakened in her fate, prepared 
the public in some degree so deeply to sympathise in her sub- 
sequent misfortune. While she was yet beneath the sunny 
sky of Italy, intelligence reached her that George III. was 
dead, and that her husband had ascended the throne. She 
demanded that a vessel of state should be sent to conduct her 
home ; but her demand met with no attention, and in a vessel 
fitted out for her safe conduct, by a private gentleman, the 
queen returned to England. 

Her arrival had been foreseen and provided for. When her 
feet pressed English soil it was the signal for the commence- 



214 



QUEEN CAROLINE. 



ment of her prosecution. If the monarch had been king 
absolute he would have had a ready means of disposing of a 
troublesome spirit. In the wonderful East they have a rapid 
mode of settling all connubial difficulties. Casting a wife into 
the Bosphorous is a sure and satisfactory mode of dissolving 
an union ; but a scarlet sack, with a queen inside, would have 
caused some disagreeable enquiries, when picked up, by a 
meddlesome public. But if the king could not make use of a 
scarlet sack, he could make use of a green bag, with a some- 
what similar design. A green bag containing charges against 
the moral conduct of the queen, and the fruit of inquiries 
previously made by a commission at Milan, was sent down to 
the Houses of Parliament, while a bill of pains and penalties 
was preparing for the queen's destruction. 

A secret committee was appointed. Foreign witnesses were 
brought over to blast the character of the hapless queen. 
Public indignation rose high, and addresses of condolence and 
congratulation were forwarded to her majesty. But all this 
was done in defiance of the king ; for the monarch forbad 
public prayer for his wife, and lodged one contumacious 
preacher in gaol, for daring to ask God's blessing on the queen. 
At length the trial came on and lasted five and forty days. 
Henry VIII. would have made shorter work of it! But 
things had changed since the Tudor reign, and his majesty 
the public had become stronger than his majesty the king. 
Brougham, Denman, and others acted as the queen's counsel. 
A noble defence they made. The forensic eloquence employed, 
was rarely if ever equalled. Says her transcendently eloquent 
counsel: — 

" By what title shall a husband, who, after swearing on the 
altar to Icve, protect, and cherish his wife, casts her away 
from him, and throws her into whatever society may beset her 



QUEEN CAROLINE. 215 

in a strange country, pretend to complain of incorrect demea- 
nour, when it is no fault of his that there remains in the bosom 
of his victim one vestige of honesty, of purity, or of honour? 
It is not denied, it cannot be denied, that levities little suited 
to her high station marked the conduct of the princess ; that 
unworthy associates sometimes found admittance to her 
presence ; that in the hands of intriguing women she became 
a tool of their silly, senseless plots ; that surrounded by crafty 
politicians, she suffered her wrongs to be used as a means of 
gratifying a place-hunting ambition which rather crawled than 
climbed : and that a character naturally only distinguished by 
mere heedless openness, and a frankness that common prudence 
seems to justify in those who dwell in palaces, became shaded, 
if not tarnished, by a disposition to join in unjustifiable con- 
trivances for self-defence. But the heavy charges of guilt 
brought against her in two several investigations, were tri- 
umphantly repelled, and by the universal assent of mankind, 
scattered on the winds amidst their universal indignation ; and 
from the blame of lesser faults and indiscretions into which 
she is admitted to have been betrayed, the least regard to the 
treatment she met with must in the contemplation of all 
candid minds altogether set her free." The prosecution was 
abandoned, and the queen was acquitted. But her troubles 
were not over. Forsaken, and broken-hearted, the health of 
the princess rapidly declined. For her there seemed no 
resting place, no peace in store. But there was quietness in 
the grave — there the wicked cease from troubling, there the 
weary are at rest, there the persecuted repose and hear not the 
voice of the oppressor. Public sympathy was with her. Her 
life was fast ebbing. She still asserted her rights as wife and 
queen. She still struggled for the crown which was truly her 
portion. 



216 QUEEN CAROLINE. 

The coronation was at hand. Expectation was on tip-toe. 
Great things were to be done. Unrivalled glories were approach- 
ing. Westminster Abbey was to present a scene of un- 
equalled splendour ; Westminster Hall was to echo to the 
challenge of the champion. George superintended the whole 
of the preparations with the greatest possible attention. His 
taste suggested the colour of the royal hangings, and the, 
width of the footmen's shoe ties. 

On the 5th of July, 1821, the queen's memorial was pre- 
sented to the king, formally preferring her claim to be 
crowned as queen consort. On the 1 0th of the same month 
the privy council rejected her claim to participate in the 
coronation. On the 19th, George the Fourth was crowned in 
Westminster Abbey. The queen attempted to gain admittance, 
■but was repulsed. Her application for admission to the hall 
was similarly rejected. It was the last blow, and from that 
day her failing health began more rapidly to decline. 

On the 30th the queen was suddenly taken ill in Drury 
Lane Theatre. She grew worse. Her danger became immi- 
nent, and on the 7th of August she expired at Hammersmith. 
Seven days later the remains of the queen were removed from 
Hammersmith on their route to Brunswick. Great tumults 
took place in London on this occasion, the procession being 
ordered by the government not to pass through the city, and the 
populace being resolved that it should pass by no other route. 
After several conflicts in which two men were shot by the 
military, the procession at length passed through London, 
and from thence to Harwich for embarkation. On the 24th 
the body of the unhappy queen was interred in the family 
vault at Brunswick. 

The inscription which she had dictated for her coffin was : — 
*' Caroline of Brunswick, the murdered Queen of England." 







oayW^U<?^.'i^, ' 



LADY EACHAEL EUSSELL. 



A marvellous thing is life. To trace the struggles of a 
living soul, its hopes and fears, its joys and sorrows, its 
anxieties and cares, as it passes through the world, throbbing 
with high and lofty aspirations — is a noble and a glorious 
study. When we rejoice with the happy, and weep with the 
sorrowful, and follow step by step the career of the great ones 
of the world, — by a sympathetic imagination we lose our 
personal identity in theirs. These are not their lives, they 
are ours ; these are not their sorrows, their joys, their 
triumphs, their defeats — ^joys and sorrows, and triumphs and 
defeats, which haply passed away centuries agone — they are 
our own ; reading their life-history we forget personal self, 
and with them weep or smile, and become the conquerors or 
the vanquished, as the case may be. "We are united with the 
men and the women of past ages by a community of nature and 
of experience. Their history is our history ; our history was 
once theirs. The story of human life, its trials and its 
temptations, has to every human being a very deep interest. 
It awakens serious reflection ; it is something more than a 
dry catalogue of facts and figures ; it is a thought-suggestive 
study. Many of the footprints in the. sands of time are 
hopeful and promising. It is a pleasant thing to trace them 
from the sea-shore to the mountains of beatitude ; to notice 
how they sometimes mounted on the hillock where the sun- 
shine fell, and how sometimes, alas, to us it seems too often, 
they had to go down into the valley, but how the journey's 

u 



218 LADY RACHAEL RUSSELL. 

end was reached at length, and the footprints are on the 
mount of holiness, Zion's celestial hill. Once these great 
ones of the world felt the weight and pressure which we now 
feel ; once they experienced the joys and sorrows and trials 
which we now experience ; once they grew weary and felt the 
want to die even as the jaded feel the want to sleep ; but if 
they were true to God, true to man, true to themselves, they 
battled on to the last. 

It is a profitable exercise thus to regard the lives of the 
great and good, and the page of history supplies numerous 
examples. And there is nothing more touching, nothing 
more useful, than the history of a life of patient endurance. 
It is a harder matter to mourn for the martyr than to meet 
the martyr's fate. To witness the sufferings of those we love, 
to be conscious of their danger, to know their coming fate and 
to have no power to help them, to tremble and wait, — this is 
severe discipline,, this is woman's trial. The sad nature of 
such suffering is doubly increased when the deepest sensi- 
bility, the fondest affection, the most exalted virtue and 
exemplary piety, meet in the soul of the patient one. It is 
this which throws around the sad story of Lady Rachael 
Russell so much of melancholy interest. 

In the year 1636 Lady Rachael Wriothesley was born, and 
" born to trouble as the sparks fly upward." At an early age 
she lost the tender solicitude of her mother, the deepest and 
severest loss a child can sustain ; the fond heart ceased to beat, 
the loving eyes were closed in death, the funeral knell 
sounded in the ear of the bereft little one, weeping her stock 
of infant tears in a long last sad adieu. 

Her father married, for his second wife, Elizabeth, daughter 
of Sir Francis Leigh. The lady had four daughters, one only 
of whom survived her parents. The earl becoming a second 



LADY RACHAEL RUSSELL. 219 

time a widower, married the Lady Frances, daughter of 
William Seymour, Duke of Somerset, and widow of Viscount 
Molineux. This lady had no children, and was left a widow 
by the Earl of Southampton. 

Much of the early life of Lady Rachael was passed in 
seclusion. Her father was a man of sincere and earnest 
piety, and her mother's family, descendants of the French 
Huguenots, instilled into her young mind the solemn teachings 
of their faith. The religion she was taught was not one of 
outward ceremonials ; although the popular, the fashionable, 
the royal faith of that epoch, was of this character. She 
was trained to believe in Him who must be worshipped in 
spirit and in truth, and if she did not at that period fully 
realize the import of the teaching, or appreciate its high- 
toned excellence, or find a relish for the things of God, truth 
was sown in her heart, truth which, though it lay for a season 
hidden, brought forth a goodly harvest in the end. 

From a fragment of a letter written by Lady Russell in 
her old age we learn that she deeply deplored her childish 
folly. '* Alas !" she says, " from my childhood I can recollect 
a backwardness to pray, and coldness when I did ; and ready 
to take, or seek cause, to be absent at the public ones. Even 
after a sickness and danger at Chelsea, spending my time 
childishly, if not idly ; and if I had read a few lines in a 
pious book, contented I had done well. Yet, at the same time, 
ready to give an ear to evil reports, and possibly malicious ones, 
and telling my mother-in-law to please her. At seventeen 
years of age was married, continued too often absent at public 
prayers, taking very light cause to be so ; liking too well the 
esteemed diversions of the town, as the park, visiting plays, 
&c., trifling away my precious time. At our return to London, 
I can recollect that I would choose on a Sunday to go to 



220 LADY RACHAEL RUSSELL. 

church at Lord B's, where the sermon would be short ; a 
great dinner, and after worldly talk. When at my father's 
the sermon would be longer and discourse more edifying. 
And too much after the same way, I fear, at my several 
returns to "Wales and England. Some time after in London, 
and then with my father's wife at Tunbridge, and after with 
her at Bath, gave too much of my time to carelessly 
indulging in idleness. At Bath, too well contented to follow 
the common way of passing the time in diversion, and 
thinking but little of what was serious ; considering more the 
health of my body than that of my soul." 

The quaint naturalness of these remarks is peculiarly cha- 
racteristic of Lady Bussell. She was thoroughly sincere. 
Her retrospection was useful because it was fairly conducted, 
and if done in the same spirit, 'tis wondrous wise 

" To talk with our past hours, 
And ask them what report they bore to heaven." 

There are two things, the loss of which she appears to regret 
very deeply — time and opportunity ; two of the greatest bles- 
sings, two of the most prolific favours, which God bestows, or 
man receives. Yet we cast them both away without a thought, 
a sigh, a word. Time is a treasure. Every one who arrives 
at eminence must be an economist of time, must gather up 
the fragments that nothing may be lost — nothing ! then surely 
not time, the most precious of all, and the most hopelessly 
irrecoverable when it is gone. 

The marriage of Lady Rachael was with Francis, Lord 
Vaughan, eldest son of the Earl of Carberry. In those days, 
alliances among the noble and wealthy were dictated by the 
monarch or the parents ; and with the parties chiefly con- 
cerned, it was as our heroine expressed herself on a subse- 



LADY RACHAEL RUSSELL. 221 

quent occasion, " acceptance, rather than choosing on either 
side." From all that is known of the union, it appears to 
have been attended with a moderate share of happiness while 
it lasted. The marriage took place about the year 1653, and 
the newly wedded pair took up their residence at Golden 
Grove, in Carmarthenshire, the seat of the Earl of Carberry. 
One child was the only fruit of the marriage, and this child 
lived but a short time ; so the young mother mourned for her 
little one — not long afterwards mourned for her husband, and 
in the second year of her widowhood, mourned the loss of her 
excellent father. 

Station cannot defend us from the troubles of life : there 
is no retreat secure from the attacks of sickness and death. 
Glory, talent, wisdom, power, bow before the great conqueror ; 
for that which befalleth beasts, befalleth the sons of men : 
" as the one dieth, so dieth the other ; yea, they have all one 
breath, so that a man hath no pre-eminence above a beast ; 
for all is vanity. All go unto one place ; all are of the dust, 
and all turn to dust again." It is a melancholy reflection, 
but it is a true one. Happy he who can shelter himself with 
confidence under the assurance of immortality, and feeling 
that *' the world is not an inn, but an hospital — a place not to 
live, but to die in," acknowledging " that piece of Divinity 
that is in us — that something that was before the elements, 
and owes no homage to the sun" — is enabled to acquire a 
mastery not only over death, but over life. " Happy, thrice 
happy he," says the Chinese epitaph, " who relies on the eter- 
nity of the soul — who believes as the loved fall one after 
another from his side, that they have returned to their native 
country" — and who awaits a Divine re-union. Lady Rachael 
felt the truth of this. Husband, father, child, might be taken 
away — they were not dead, but sleeping — she saw, far over the 

u 2 



222 LADY RACHAEL RUSSELL. 

melancholy seas, the haven she would reach at last — she be- 
lieved that every struggle has its reward, that every sorrow 
has its balm — that however forsaken or bereaved below, we 
can never be deserted, for an eye that never sleeps is watching ; 
eternal power and eternal love are enlisted on our behalf. 
E/evealed religion breathed its exalted eloquence through her 
heart, and listening to the voice of Him who never spake as 
man spakfe, she learned the lessons of sublimest wisdom. 

At this period of her life she was in prosperous circum- 
stances. She resided at Titchfield, the home of her childhood, 
with her sister. Lady Elizabeth Noel. Lady Percy had been 
anxious to have her at Petworth, a desire in which all the noble 
family concurred. But there was something in the quiet and 
retirement of Titchfield which had for her peculiar charms. Of 
all people, the English are distinguished by an attachment to 
home. The ancients, indeed, loved and worshipped the " Ve- 
neranda Domus ;" they familiarly invoked and piously pre- 
served their household gods ; but our penates are no graven 
images — they are the memories of our childhood, the recollec- 
tions of our earliest years. It was these remembrances that 
made Titchfield so beautiful to Lady Rachael. It was her old 
home. There she had felt her first anxieties, and her earliest 
hopes ; there she had experienced the ineflfable yearnings of 
love, and this it was that gave new splendour to the sky, new 
glory to the flowers. 

" Prosperity has been justly represented as comprehending 
the enjoyment of health, agreeable relations, attached and 
faithful friends, and a degree of wealth above mere compe- 
tency, — sufficient to secure from all the evils of dependence, 
and to afi'ord not only the necessaries, but the conveniences, 
indulgences and embellishments of life." All these were for 
a time the portion of Lady Rachael. She was universally be- 



LADY RACHAEL RUSSELL. 223 

loved and respected, and in the society of her sister, whom she 
afterwards characterised as " a delicious friend," she passed a 
very happy season. 

It is probable that the meeting of the widowed Lady 
Vaughan, with her second husband, took place while she resi- 
ded at TitcMeld. Mr. "William Russell, as he was called 
during his elder brother's life, was second son of William, Earl 
of Bedford ; and having, like all younger brothers in Britain, no 
great fortune, either in reality or in expectancy, the worldly 
advantages in a connection with Lady Vaughan lay all on his 
side, since her father's death had made her a considerable 
heiress. She was, however, entirely her own mistress ; and 
as soon as the mutual sentiments of Mr. Russell and herself 
were discovered, they were united to each other. This mar- 
riage, which lasted through fourteen years of such happiness 
as rarely falls to the lot of human beings, took place in the 
end of the year 1672. Fortunately, a blow like the one which 
destroyed that happiness, is not less rare in its occurrence. 

After their union, Mr. Russell and Lady Vaughan resided, 
during the winter, at their town residence, Southampton 
House, but Stratton was their favourite summer retreat. 

The man with whose fate Lady Rachael had now bound up 
her own, was one whose career, in its progress and end, con- 
stitutes an era in the history of his country. Heir, as he be- 
came, some time after his marriage, to one of the wealthiest 
and noblest families in Britain, William Lord Russell was fore- 
most, to use the words of a descendant, " in defending the 
rights of the people. Busily occupied in the aifairs of public 
life, he was, at the same time, revered in his own family as 
the best of husbands and of fathers ; he joined the truest 
sense of religion with the unqualified assertion of freedom ; 
and, after an honest perseverance in a good cause, at length 



224 LADY RACHAE^L RUSSELL. 

attested, on the scaffold, his attachment to the ancient princi- 
ples of the constitution of his country." Such was the being 
on whom the hand and heart of Lady Rachael were bestowed ; 
and keeping this view of his character in mind, the reader will 
understand and appreciate the deep affection, and reverence 
almost, apparent in all the letters of the vrife to her husband. 
There are two or three letters from Lady Rachael to her hus- 
band, at Woburn, when he was visiting his father there, and 
during his election for the county of Bedford, which took place 
in two successive parliaments. There is a letter addressed to 
him while he was attending the parliament at Oxford, and a 
few others directed to him in London. These letters beauti- 
fully delineate both the characters of Lady Rachael and her 
husband. With extracts from these we continue our narrative. 

London, Sept, 2Srd, 1672. 

" If I were more fortunate in my expression, I could do 
myself more right when I own to my dearest Mr. Russell 
what real and perfect happiness I enjoy, from that kindness he 
allows me every day to receive new marks of ; such as, in 
spite of the knowledge I have of my own wants, will not suffer 
me to mistrust ; I want his love, though I do not merit so 
desirable a blessing ; but my best life, you that know so well 
how to love, and to oblige, make my felicity entire, by believ- 
ing my heart possessed with all the gratitude, honour, and 
passionate affection to your person any creature is capable of, 
or can be obliged to ; and that granted, what have I to ask, 
but a continuance (if God see fit) of these present enjoyments ? 
if not, a submission without a murmur to His most wise dis- 
pensations and unerring providence, having a thankful heart 
for the years I have been so perfectly contented in. He knows 
best when we have had enough here : what I most earnestly 



LADY RACHAEL RUSSELL. 225 

beg from His mercy is, that we both live so as whichever goes 
first, the other may not sorrow as one for whom they have no 
hope ; then let us cheerfully expect to be together to a good 
old age ; if not, let us not doubt but He will support His ser- 
vants under what trials He will inflict upon them. These 
are necessary meditations sometimes, that we may not be 
surprised above our strength by sudden accident, being unpre- 
pared. Excuse me if I dwell too long upon it ; it is from my 
opinion, that if we can be prepared for all conditions, we can 
with the greater tranquillity enjoy the present ; which I hope 
will be long, though when we change it will be for the better, 
I trust, through the merit of Christ. Let us daily pray it may 
be so, and then admit of no fears. Death is the extremest 
evil against nature, it is true ; let us overcome the immoderate 
fear of it, either to ourselves or self, and then what light hearts 
may we live with ! but I am immoderate in my length of this 
discourse, and consider this to be a letter." 

The other part of the letter was strictly of family and court 
intelligence. There is in the whole tone of the epistle that 
spirit of ardent devotion and unshaken faith in God, which were 
the characteristics of the noble lady. God was in all her 
thoughts. There was nothing of chance or accident in her 
philosophy. God ruled. Every affair of life was governed 
by His hand, and with filial confidence she looked to Him, 
the Father in heaven, better than any fathers here on earth. 
A letter dated eight years later, breathes the same spirit of 
loving submission to the dispensations of God, and of fond 
attachment to her husband. She writes : — 

*' Absent or present, my dearest life, is equally obliging, 
and ever the earthly delight of my soul. It is ray great care, 
or ought to be so, so to moderate my sense of happiness here, 
that when the appointed time comes of my leaving, or its leav- 



226 LADY RACHAEL RUSSELL. 

ing me, I may not be unwilling to forsake the one, or be in 
some measure prepared to bear the trial of the other," 

Lady Kussell's letters are the only account we have of her 
wedded life. After the birth of her children, two daughters, 
and subsequently a son, her correspondence receives, if possi- 
ble, a deeper shade of interest. " Almost every letter of Lady 
Russell's after she became a mother, contains," says one of her 
biographers, *' some reference to her child or children." " I 
write in the nursery." — "Your father comes to see our Miss ; 
carried me to dinner at Bedford House." (After mentioning 
the illness of her sister's child.) " Ours fetched but one sleep 
last night, and was very good this morning." — "Your girls 
are very well and good." — " Miss Rachael has prattled a 
long story ; but Watkins calls for my letter, so I must omit 
it. She says, papa has sent for her to ' Woobee,* and then 
she gallops away, and says she has been there, and a good 
deal more." — " My girls and I have just risen from dinner. 
Miss Rachael followed -nfre into my chamber, and, seeing me 
take the pen and ink, as^-ed me what I was going to do. I 
told her I was going to writs, to her papa. ' So will I,' said 
she ; * and while you write, i will think what I have to say.' 
And truly, before I could write one word, she came and told 
me she had done, so I set down her words." — " The report 
of our nursery, I humbly praise God, is very good. Master 
improves, really, I think, every day. Sure he is a goodly 
child. The more I see of others, the better he appears. 
I hope God will give him life and virtue. Misses, and their 
mamma, walked yesterday after dinner, to see their cousin 
Allington. Miss Kate wished that she might see him, so I 
gratified her little person." — " Boy is asleep ; girls singing 
in bed." — "Both your girls are well. Your letter was che- 
rished as it deserved." — "I have felt one true delight this 



LADY RACHAEL RUSSELL. 227 

morning already, being just come from our nurseries, and am 
now preparing for another, these being my true moments of 
pleasure, till the presence of my dearest life is before my eyes 
again." 

From letters such as those from which the foregoing quota- 
tions are made, we gain a deeper and a clearer insight into the 
governing principles, the hopes and fears of the writer, than 
we could otherwise obtain from the most elaborate analysis of 
character. And from these light and apparently ephemeral 
productions, we are admitted into many home secrets, which 
we could not otherwise learn ; while at the same time they 
exhibit to us the state of society, mode of travelling, and pre- 
sent a lively picture of the manners of the day. From Tun- 
bridge Wells, Lady Eussell writes to her husband in London : — 

" After a toilsome day, there is some refreshment to be tel- 
ling one's story to our best friends. I have seen your girl 
well laid in bed, and ourselves have made our supper upon 
biscuits, a bottle of wine, and another of beer, mingled my 
uncle's way, with nutmeg and sugar,. None are disposing for 
bed, none so much as complaining of weariness. Beds and 
things are all very well here, uur want is yourself and your 
good weather. But now I have told you our present 
conditions, to say a little of the past. I do really think, 
if I could have imagined the illness of the roads, it would have 
discouraged me. It is not to be expressed, how bad the way 
is from Sevenoaks, but our horses did exceedingly well, and 
Spencer very diligent, often off his horse to lay hold on the 
coach. I have not much more to say this night ; I hope the 
quilt is remembered, and Frances must remember to send 
more biscuits, either when you come, or soon after. I long 
to hear from you, my dearest life, and truly think your absence 
already an age. I have no mind to my gold plate, here is no 



228 LADY RACHAE.L RUSSELL. 

table to set it on, but if that does not come, I desire you would 
bid Betty Foster send the silver glass I use every day. In 
discretion I haste to bed, longing for Monday, I assure you." 
From yours, 

"R. Russell." 

"Past 10 o'clock." 

This longing for Monday speaks volumes. Henry VIII. 
could not have said a more loving thing to the gentle Lady 
Anne. It has the full tone of a love-note. But it was a love- 
note after a wedding, for the courtship of Lady Rachael and 
her husband did not end with the Amen of the marriage ser- 
vice. And to us, with our Bradshaw's Railway Guide, and 
our country intersected with the metallic net-work of broad 
and narrow guage, there is something very odd and marvellous 
in the wearisome journey to Tunbridge. 

There is one very familiar letter written from Stratton — she 
says : — 

" * * * They will tell you how well I got hither ; 
and how well I found our dear treasure. Your boy will please 
you. You will, I think, find him improved, though I tell 
you so before-hand. They fancy he wanted you ; for as soon 
as I alighted, he followed, calling papa. But I suppose it is 
the word he has most command of, so was not disobliged by 
the little fellow. The girls were first in remembrance of the 
happy 29th of September ; and we drank your health after a 
red deer pie ; and at night your girls and I supped on a sack- 
posset ; nay, Master would have his soon, and for haste, burnt 
his fingers in the posset, but he does but rub his hands for it." 

Lord Russell fully reciprocated the affectionate sentiments 
of his wife. His notes breathe the same kind and loving 
spirit. The following are specimens. 

" I suppose you received mine of Thursday. I hope this 



LADY RACHAEL RUSSELL. 229 

will be the last time for this 'bout of troubling you in this 
kind, for on Tuesday, God willing, I intend to set out to go 
to ray dearest dear's embraces, which I value now as much 
as I did ten, eleven, or twelve years ago. If the coach can 
conveniently come to Hartford Bridge, on Tuesday, let it. 
Else, Will, will ride upon Great Dun. I am just now come 
from eating oysters with your sister, which shall be all my 
supper, and I hope to go to bed earlier than I have been able 
to do hitherto. My father is not come to town. Farewell, 
my dearest; kiss my little children from me, and believe me 
to be as entirely as I am, yours and only yours, 

Russell." 
Again : — 

"I have stole from a great many gentlemen into the 
drawing-room at Basing for a moment to tell my dearest 
I have thought of her being here the last time, and wished 
for her a thousand times ; but in vain, alas ! for I am just 
now going to Stratton and want the chariot, and dearest dear 
in it. I hope to be with you on Saturday. We have had a 
troublesome journey of it, and insignificant enough, by the 
fairness and civility of somebody ; but more of that when I 
see you. I long for the time, and am more than you can 
imagine, 

Your Russell." 

It is a beautiful thing this home love, this fond endear- 
ment, pleasant to turn away from the busy turmoil of the 
world, from the stormy debates of the parliament, and to find 
the patriot and statesman writing such loving and familiar 
letters. Happy seemed the lot of Lady Russell. Her hus- 
band, her friends, her children, her servants, loved and 
honoured her. The generous sympathy of her disposition led 

X 



230 LADY RACHAEL RUSSELL. 

her to concern herself in the well-heing of ail who were in 
any way connected with her ; she rejoiced with those that did 
rejoice, and wept with those that wept. But trouble was at 
hand. It is an easy matter to be thankful while we enjoy 
the bounty of God's providence, while we bask in the sun- 
shine of his smile, but faith, and love, and hope, are tried by 
affliction. " If thou faint in the day of adversity thy strength 
is small !" 

The grievances of centuries had been accumulating. The 
days of the Tudors were a transition period ; the country 
was on the eve of a great change, when the Stuarts ascended 
the throne. The troubles of the first Charles we need not 
detail here, nor tell how all England was shaken by the civil 
war. The monarch perished. The Commonwealth was 
declared. Cromwell died, and the second Charles was res- 
tored as king of England. Then discontent broke out afresh. 
The king had all the leaning towards arbitrary power, the love 
of ease and enjoyment at any cost, the disregard of popular 
rights and the profound faith in the principle of legitimacy, 
which distinguished and ruined his race. He, therefore, 
speedily commenced the same attacks upon the constitution 
of the kingdom which had brought his father to the scaffold. 
The great object of his dislike was the protestant religion, 
and to overthrow it now became the darling object of the 
courtiers, but particularly of the Duke of York. 

The people trembled for their lives and their liberties. 
They had an instinctive dread of Catholicism. Dismal fore- 
bodings which took their tone and colour from the past, 
filled the breasts of all. The elements of combustion were 
everywhere to be found, and it only required one spark of fire 
to set the whole country in a blaze. But the parliamentary 
history of the period contains the record of the passing of 



LADY RACHAEL RUSSELL. 231 

some measures worthy of all praise. Says a recent 
writer ; — 

" The parliament which was dissolved in May, 1679, passed 
one measure at least which must for ever entitle it to the 
grateful remembrance of every Englishman of whatever sect 
or party — the Habeas Corpus Act. Previous to this, although 
it was a generally acknowledged legal maxim that every man 
accused of committing a breach of the law should be brought 
to trial as speedily as possible after his apprehension, the 
intrigues of faction, the caprices of arbitrary power, or the 
spite of underlings, too often left him pining in prison for years 
without an opportunity of defending himself, and sometimes 
in ignorance of the offence with which he was charged. The 
Habeas Corpus Act enabled every one to protect himself 
against arbitrary arrest and imprisonment, by suing out a writ 
addressed to the jailor, commanding him to produce him in 
open court, and state why he detained him in custody. Next 
to the Magna Charta this is the mainstay of English freedom, 
and surrounds personal liberty with a barrier which none save 
the law, can enter. 

" This parliament also freed the English press. Previous 
to the great Revolution, all printers were liable to punishment 
by the Star Chamber for transgressing the laws and regula- 
tions which it laid down, and which, with the refinement of des- 
potism, were never made known, and, perhaps, never existed, 
until some unfortunate publisher had incurred its anger. He 
was then pilloried, or whipped, or branded, or had his ears 
cut off, or his nose slit, or was hanged, according to the mag- 
nitude of his offence, or the wrath of his judges. This court, 
it will be believed, was never popular with the parliament 
or the people. Accordingly it was a standing grievance in 
every petition and remonstrance addressed to the king, during 



232 LADY RACHAEL RUSSELL, 

the Struggles which preceded the Revolution. After that 
event it fell with the throne. Milton then addressed to the 
Long Parliament that eloquent protest against all restrictions 
on the liberty of the press, which alone, were it the only 
one of his productions which had come down to us, would be 
sufficient to place him in the front rank of English authors 
||||| and philosophers. Independently of its rich and vigorous 

Style, it is full of thoughts, of which few men in that day 
knew anything, — broad and sound ideas of liberty and good 
government, which slumbered on our library shelves for one 
hundred years or more after the blind old man who con- 
ceived them had been resting in his grave, and which have 
only within the latter part of the present half-century started 
into life and action. But Milton was not able to make the 
world beat time to the throbbings of his own great heart. 
The essay on the Liberty of Unlicensed Printing was written 
for another age than his. The parliament did not heed him. 
It abolished the Star Chamber, to be sure, but established a 
censorship in its stead, and by this the printers and authors 
were kept in bonds until the year 1679." 

In the passing of these two measures, as in all others of a 
like nature, William Lord Eussell took an active part. He 
was not a man of showy talents, or of ardent tempera- 
ment, but of high-toned principle and unshrinking firmness, 
willing to die, if it came to that. On the Restoration, he had 
been elected member of parliament for Tavistock, and sub- 
sequently for Bedfordshire. For twelve years he was a silent 
member, but not a careless observer ; woe for us if we had 
nothing but what could speak and clamour for reform. That 
silent watching produced its results, and called forth the 
native energy of his character, which never afterwards slept 
but on the scaffold. 



LADY RACHAEL RUSSELL. 233 

A devoted wife in every respect, Lady Russell watched her 
husband's public career with the attentive eyes of affection. 
But while she deeply sympathised with his just and noble 
principles, and [honoured his adherence to them, she could 
not fail to see the dangers he incurred. There are hints and 
cautions in her letters which show us her quick-sighted 
affection. One or two may suffice : — 

*' My sister being here, tells me she overheard you tell her 
lord, last night, that you would take notice of the business 
(you know what I mean) in the house. This alarms me ; 
and I do earnestly beg of you to tell me truly, if you have, 
or mean to do it. If you do I am most assured you will 
repent it. I beg once more to know the truth. 'Tis more 
pain to be in doubt, and for your sister too. If I have any 
interest I use it to beg your silence in this case, at least 
to-day. 

" R. Russell." 

" Look to your pockets : a printed paper says you will have 
fine papers put into them, and witnesses to swear. One 
remembrance more my best love : — Be wise as a serpent, 
harmless as a dove. So farewell for this time. 

"E,. Russell." 

These letters shew us the dark misgivings and terrible 
forebodings which were in the mind of Lady Russell, but 
well as she might know the state of party feeling and of 
party politics, she could but little have suspected the shame- 
ful doom which awaited her beloved lord. The political 
horizon was overcast. It was said that the Lord Treasurer 
Danby had sold England to France, that a plot was being 
laid to hand over this country to French and papal ascendancy. 
Monmouth, the illegitimate son of Charles by a Welsh girl, 

x2 



234 LADY RACHAEL RUSSELL. 

was set up iu opposition to the Duke of York as a claimant 
to the crown. Monmouth's popularity added immensely to- 
the opposition. On the one side it was maintained that the 
constitution and religion of the state would never be secure 
under a popish king ; on the other that the right of 
James to wear the crown in his turn was derived from God, 
and could not be annulled, even hy the consent of all the 
branches of the legislature. Every county, every town, every 
family was in agitation. The civilities and hospitalities of 
the neighbourhood were interrupted. The dearest ties of 
friendship and of blood were sundered. Even school boys 
were divided into angry parties ; and the Duke of York and 
the Earl of Shaftesbury had zealous adherents on all the 
forms of Westminster and Eton. The theatres shook with 
the roar for contending factions. Pope Joan was brought on 
the stage by the zealous protestants. Pensioned poets filled 
their prologues and epilogues with eulogies of the king and the 
duke. The malcontents besieged the throne with petitions, 
demanding that parliament might be forthwith convened. 
The loyalists sent up addresses expressing the utmost abhor- 
rence of all who presumed to dictate to the sovereign. The 
Citizens of London assembled by tens of thousands to burn 
the pope in effigy. The government posted cavalry at Temple 
Bar, and placed ordnance round Whitehall. In that year our 
tongue was enriched with the two words Mob and Sham — 
remarkable memorials for a season of tumult and imposture.* 
Parliament met again in 1680. The Exclusion Bill was 
again introduced, and passed the Commons readily. Lord 
William Russell carried it up to the Lords, and thus drew 
upon himself the hatred of the court party, and above all^ of 

• Macaulay. 



LADY KACHAEL RUSSELL. 23-5 

the Duke of York, who hated, — as a superstitious bigot always 
liates, — to the death. The debate in the House of Lords was 
loud and long. The peers poured out vituperation fiercely as 
quarrelsome coal-heavers. They sprang to their feet and 
clapped their hands to their swords, as in the terrible days of 
the Long Parliament. The king was present, smiled upon his 
friends, and marked his enemies, and dissolved parliament once 
more. The next he summoned to meet at Oxford, fearing that 
if matters came to a crisis the London train-bands might once 
again, as they had done before, decide the quarrel in a sum- 
mary manner. " The session at Oxford," Macaulay says, 
"resembled a Polish diet rather than an English parliament." 
The Whigs repaired to the place of meeting on horseback, 
surrounded by their retainers all armed, the latter scowling 
fiercely on the royal guards ; one blow struck in anger, and 
the civil war was begun. The Exclusion Bill was still insisted 
on, but to this the king steadfastly refused his assent. 
Anything but this he would grant, but this he would not grant, 
and once again dissolved parliament. 

The alarm of Lady Russell was not without reason. Her 
husband it was who had prepared and actively engaged in the 
attempt to carry the Exclusion Bill. The government was 
Argus-eyed, and never forgave. In 16S3, a design was de- 
tected called "The Rye House Plot." One of the conspira- 
tors, whose name was Rumbold, was a maltster who possessed 
a farm which lay on the road to Newmarket, whither the 
king repaired once a year to honour the race-course with his 
presence. Here it was proposed to waylay the monarch, and 
50 fire upon him from behind the hedges as to escape detection. 
In this scheme Lord Russell was said to have taken an active 
part. But the assertion is without foundation, and it has been 
affirmed on no mean authority, that it was concealed with 



236 LADY RACHAEL RUSSELL. 

especial care from the upright and humane Lord RusselL 
But it was a fine opportunity for revenge. Law was a mockery 
— its presiding officer, a bloated blustering mimic of humanity, 
and justice had fled from the land ! 

Lord Russell was perfectly aware of his danger ; but he 
never lost his self-possession. A messenger of council was 
stationed at his gate, to stop him if he should offer to go out. 
But the back gate was not watched, so that he had opportunity 
to escape. Yet it is not in the hero's heart to fly — a noble- 
minded man, once fairly involved, will never shrink at 
danger. He feared not the face of man. He, however, 
thought it proper to send his wife amongst his friends, to 
advise whether or not he should withdraw himself. And the 
noble-hearted woman was not overwhelmed. She saw the 
danger, she noticed the wave of trouble that broke with 
thundering violence on the shore, she felt that there was no 
escape from the advancing tide ; but the Lord on high is 
mightier than the noise of many waters, yea, than the mighty 
waves of the sea. 

The opinions of Lord Russell's friends varied, and a chill 
must have struck her as she listened to the diverse plans they 
proposed ; but in one thing they were all agreed, it would 
never do to fly — it would look like an acknowledgement of 
guilt — he must stay and brave the danger. So he stopped at 
his residence, Southampton House, till the king arrived in 
London, and he was then summoned to appear before the 
council. When face to face with the monarch, the king told 
him that nobody suspected him of a design upon his person, 
but that he had good evidence of his being in design against 
the government. Lord Russell totally denied all knowledge 
of the affair at the Rye House : but what was his denial 
worth, when the rulers were resolved upon his death? A 



LADY RACHAEL RUSSELL. 337 

close prisoner he was sent to the Tower, and from that moment 
looked upon himself as a dying man. 

Within a few weeks after the date of the letters we 
have given, Lord Russell was examined, and committed 
to the Tower, on a charge of treasonable conspiracy. It is 
not our business to investigate this matter, further than 
as it illustrates the character of Lady Rachael. Her hus- 
band's own saying, long before this event, that " Arbi- 
trary government could not be set up in England without 
wading through his blood," may explain the feelings with 
which the lady viewed the proceedings of his enemies. From 
the hour of his imprisonment. Lord Russell regarded himself 
as a doomed man. Whatever were the forebodings of his 
wife she did not allow herself to sink into the inactivity of 
despair. Every moment between the imprisonment and trial 
was spent by Lady Rachael in anxious, yet clear-sighted, 
preparations for his defence. The following note is the best 
evidence of her employment at this moment ; it was written 
immediately before the trial : — " Your friends, believing I can 
do you some service at your trial, I am extremely willing to 
try ; my resolution will hold out — pray let yours. But it may 
be the court will not let me ; however, do you let me try. I 
think, however, to meet you at Richardson's and then resolve ; 
your brother Ned will be with me, and sister Margaret." 

Lord Russell's trial took place at the Old Bailey, July IS, 
1683. The proceedings were thoroughly disgraceful. Law 
and justice were offered up as a sacrifice on the altar of loyalty. 
Throngs after throngs poured onward towards the scene of 
trial. The court was densely crowded — so crowded indeed 
that the council complained of not having room to stand. And 
there was Lady Russell. The throng gave way as she passed 
through them, all eyes were fixed upon her, there was a thrill 
of anguish throughout the large assembly. 



i 



II 



238 LADY RACHAEL RUSSELL. 

The prisoner having obtained the use of pen, ink, and paper, 
with such documents as he might wish to produce, asked — 

*' May I have somebody to help my memory ?" 

" Yes," replied the Attorney General, *' a servant." 

" Any of your servants," added the Lord Chief Justice, 
" shall assist you in writing anything you please." 

" My wife," replied Lord Russell, " is here to do it." 

At that moment. Lady Russell arose by her husband's side. 
A deep impression was produced, and the Lord Chief Justice 
said in a softened tone : — 

*' Will my lady give herself that trouble ?" 

The Attorney General offered two persons to write for him, 
if his lordship pleased. But the lady still offered her services, 
and notwithstanding her overwhelming distress, she was ena- 
bled so to control her feelings, as neither to disturb the court, 
nor to distract the attention of her husband. 

Lord Russell was very urgent for one day longer before the 
trial, because he was expecting witnesses who might arrive 
before night. But this was refused. He then asked for a 
postponement until the afternoon, but this also was denied 
him, and the proceedings begun. He pleaded not guilty. 
Three witnesses were examined against him, no one of whom 
proved anything amounting to a charge of high treason ; but 
according to the odious doctrine of constructive treason, which 
was often put into practice in those arbitrary times, the evi- 
dence of all the three put together, was held sufficient to con- 
demn him. It may give some idea of the spirit which anima- 
ted his prosecutors, when we mention that words spoken in his 
presence merely by others, were proffered and received as 
valid proof of his intentions. 

When all the evidence had been gone through, the accused 
called persons of standing and repute to speak to his character. 



LADY RACHAEL RUSSELL. 239 

Dr. Burnet testified to his loyalty and integrity — so did Lord 
Cavendish ; Dr. Tillotson thought hira " a person of great 
virtue and integrity ;" Dr. Cox said, " he had often had occa- 
sion to speak with my Lord Eussell in private, and having 
been himself against all risings, or anything that tended to the 
disorder of the public, he had heard my Lord Russell profess 
solemnly that it would ruin the best cause in the world to take 
any of these irregular ways of preserving it." The Duke of 
Somerset " had known him for two years, and had been often 
in his company, and had never heard anything from him but 
what was very honourable, loyal, and just." Several other 
noblemen and divines testified to the same effect. 

The court adjourned till four o'clock, when the jury brought 
in the said Lord Russell guilty of the said high treason. His 
lordship was brought to the bar to receive sentence, and the 
clerk of the court repeated the words :-— 

" What canst thou say for thyself why judgment of death 
should not be passed upon thee ?" 

Lord Eussell desired that his indictment might be read. 
When the clerk came to the words, " conspiring the death of 
the king," his lordship interposed, and reminded the court, 
that the witnesses had sworn to a *' conspiracy to levy war, 
but to no intention of killing the king." The protest was re- 
jected, judgment was demanded, and a traitor's doom pro- 
nounced. 

From the moment of the condemnation, Lady Russell was 
incessantly occupied in various attempts to obtain a reversal 
or mitigation of the sentence. For his sake — and that his 
composure might be unbent, she departed with him from the 
scene of doom without outward violence of grief. Yet hope 
did not wholly forsake her. Wherever a glimmer of hope 
shone, that way she tried. She knelt at the feet of the king, 



240 LADY RACHAEL RUSSELL. 

and pled for mercy — mercy which was refused to her appeal ; 
and when at last the truth came upon her that her beloved 
husband must die, she sought her husband's presence in the 
prison, that she might be with him, see and hear him, while 
he was yet on earth. Bishop Burnet, who attended Lord 
Russell in his last hours, gives the following affecting nar- 
ration : — 

" The day before his death he received the sacrament with 
much devotion, and I preached two short sermons to hira, 
which he heard with great affection, and we were shut up until 
towards evening. Then Lady Russell brought him his little 
children that he might take leave of them, in which he main- 
tained his firmness, though he was a fond father. Some few 
of his friends likewise came to bid him farewell. He spoke 
to his children in a way suited to their age, and with great 
cheerfulness, and took leave of his friends in so calm a manner 
as surprised them all. Lady Russell returned alone in the 
evening. At eleven o'clock she left him ; he kissed her four 
or five times, and she kept her sorrow so within herself, that 
she gave him no disturbance at parting. As soon as she was 
gone, he said to me, ' Now the bitterness of death is past ;' for 
he loved and esteemed her beyond expression, as she well 
deserved it in all respects." 

He ran out into a long discourse concerning her, said how 
great a blessing she had been to him, and what a misery it 
would have been to him if she had not had that magnanimity 
of spirit, joined to her tenderness, as never to have desired 
him to do a base thing to save his life. Whereas, what a 
week he should have passed if she had been crying on him 
to turn informer, and to be a Lord Howard ! He then 
repeated to Dr. Burnet what he had often said before, 
that he knew of nothing whereby the peace of the nation 



LADY RACHAEL RUSSELL. 241 

was endangered : and that all that ever was, was either 
loose discourse, or, at most, embryos that never came to 
any thing. So there was nothing on foot to his knowledge. 
He then went on to talk of his wife. He said, there was 
a signal providence of God in giving him such a wife. 
where there was birth, fortune, great understanding, great 
religion, and great kindness to him : but her carriage, in 
his extremity, was beyond all. He said that he was glad 
that she and his children were to lose nothing by his 
death, and it was great comfort to him that he left his 
children in such a mother's hands, and that she had pro- 
mised him to take care of herself for their sakes. Then 
he spoke of his own situation, and said, how great a 
change death made, and how wonderfully those new scenes 
would strike on a soul. He had heard how some that had 
been born blind were struck, when, by the couching of 
their cataracts, they saw ; but what, he said, if the first 
thing they saw were the sun rising ! It was an old notion, 
hut a very sublime one. Long ago Aristotle had uttered 
the same thought, but with what a different significance ! 

The night before his execution. Lord Eussell would not 
permit a servant to remain in the room. He lay down 
and slept soundly till four the following morning. When 
Burnet entered and found him asleep, he awoke him, say- 
ing :— 

" What, my lord ! asleep ?" 

" Yes, Doctor," Russell made answer, " I have slept 
heartily since one o'clock. Let Rachael know that I am 
well, that I have slept well, and that I hope she has done 
the same." 

We need not dwell upon what followed, nor tell how 
the crowds assembled in Lincoln's Inn Fields, then veritable 



242 LADY RACHAJ;L RUSSELL. 

fields, and saw the last scene of the hero's life. "We tnm 
away to glance at the desolate mourner. 

Notwithstanding the strength of Lady Eussell's mind, it 
had nearly sunk under the severity of her affliction. Her 
letters for some time after her husband's death exhibit her 
struggling to bend her thoughts to resignation to the will of 
heaven, " You that knew us both," says she, to her friend 
Dr. Fitzwilliam, " and how we lived, must allow that I have 
just cause to bewail my loss. I know it is common with 
others to lose a friend ; but to have lived with such a one, it 
may be questioned how few can glory in the like happiness ; 
so, consequently, lament the like loss. Who can but shrink 
from such a blow ? * * * Lord, let me understand the 
reason of these dark and wounding providences, that I sink 
not under the discouragement of my own thoughts ! I know 
I have deserved ray punishment, and will be silent under it : 
yet secretly my heart mourns, too sadly, I fear, and cannot 
be comforted, because I have not the dear companion and 
sharer of all my joys and sorrows. I want him to talk with, 
to walk with, to eat and sleep with. All these things are 
irksome to me." Her mental struggles in time found a balm 
in the nurture and education of her children, to whom she 
now devoted her whole care. And amply did they repay her 
attention. Three days, however, in each year. Lady Russell 
ever held as days of solemnity — the day of her marriage, of 
her lord's trial, and of his death. 

In the days of old, when the sisters sought the grave of 
Lazarus, and Mary wept beside his tomb, there was small 
comfort in the consolations of those that gathered round, but in 
the words of Him v/ho was the friend of Lazarus, there was 
hope, and joy, and comfort. To Lady Russell human sympa- 
thy was offered and accepted, but still the true spring of 



LADY RACHAEL RUSSELL. 243 

support was within the mourner's heart — her filial confidence 
was still unshaken, and she still held fast those exceeding 
great and precious promises which insure supplies of 
grace and energy according to our need : — *' Thy shoes shall 
be iron and brass ; and as thy day is, so shall thy strength 
be." — " When thou passest through the waters I will be with 
thee ; and through the rivers, they shall not overflow thee : 
when thou walkest through the fire, thou shalt not be burned, 
neither shall the flame kindle upon thee." — " I will never 
leave thee, nor forsake thee." 

So the bereaved mother employed herself in the education 
of her children. Dr. Burnet writes, (Feb. 1684) " I am very 
glad you mean to occupy so much of your time in the education 
of your children, that they shall need no other governess. For 
as it is the greatest part of your duty, so it will be a noble 
entertainment to you, and the best diversion and cure of your 
wasted and wounded spirit." She watched over them, and 
strove effectively to supply the place of both parents : — 

" Lo ! at the couch where infant beauty sleeps, 
Her silent watch the mournful mother keeps ; 
Or, while the lovely babe unconscious lies, 
' Smiles on her slumbering child with pensive eye 
And weaves a song of melancholy joy ; — 
Sleep, image of thy father, sleep my boy. 
Bright as his manly sire, the son shall be 
In form and soul : but ah ! more blest than he ; 
Thy fame, thy worth, thy filial love at last 
Shall soothe this aching heart for all the past !" 

She had the happiness of seeing her children walking in the 
paths of virtue ; and her daughters, on reaching womanhood, 
were sought in marriage by the noblest and proudest families 
in the kingdom. The eldest married the heir of the Cavendish 



244 LADY RACHAJIL RUSSELLo 

family, and in time became Duchess of Devonshire. In like 
manner, by marrying the eldest son, the second daughter be- 
came ultimately Duchess of Rutland. By these families, and 
many other connexions, Lady Russell, during the forty years 
which were allotted to her on earth after her husband's exe- 
cution, was looked up to as a counsellor and guide ; not only 
in those matters which woman can best regulate, but on every 
occasion of worldly difficulty or distress. Many, many letters, 
written during her protracted widowhood, have been preserved, 
all of which breathe the same spirit of kindliness and prudence 
that pervades her earlier correspondence. 

The high esteem in which she was held, was such as to 
induce all, who had any claim on her notice, to seek her advice 
and good offices. " She opened her mouth with wisdom ; and 
on her tongue was the law of kindness." Adversity had not 
rendered her morose or discontented ; it had but served more 
beautifully to develop the latent tenderness and forbearance 
of her disposition. She lived to see her maternal cares 
crowned with a blessing, the honour of her husband vindicated, 
and his principles triumphant. In her declining years she 
suffered much from ill health, and it was feared that she would 
lose her sight. The operation of couching was, however, 
successfully performed. 

In those days the small pox raged with frightful violence. 
Lady Russell shared the common dread of the visitation, not 
on her own account, but on that of her son. Her appre- 
hensions are very apparent in the letters that she wrote at that 
period. We can scarcely form an idea of the ravages of that 
disease, when inoculation and vaccination were both unknown. 
In 1711, the son of Lady Russell took the small pox. The 
thing which she greatly feared had come upon her. His 
wife and children were immediately removed from his residence. 



LADY RACHAEL RUSSELL. 245 

The disorder grew worse, and its fatal issue was beyond a 
doubt ; — but his aged mother, then seventy-five, lingered 
beside him, and saw him breathe his last. " I did not know 
the greatness of my love to his person," she writes, " till I 
could see him no more. When nature, who will be mistress, 
has in some measure, with time, relieved herself, then, and 
not till then, I trust the goodness which hath no bounds, and 
whose power is irresistible, will assist me, by his grace, to 
rest contented with what his unerring providence has appointed 
and permitted." 

During the remainder of her life she maintained an un 
ceasing interest in all that related to the welfare of her friends. 
" I am very certain," she said, " that the fastest cement of 
friendship is piety." 

Of her last illness but little is known. She was suddenly 
seized with sickness. On hearing of it, her only surviving 
child hastened to London. Lady Rachael Morgan, writing 
to her brother, says : — " The bad account we have received of 
Grandmamma Russell, has put us into great disorder and 
hurry. Mamma has left us and gone to London. * * * 
1 believe she has stopped the letters on the road, for none 
have come here to-day, so that we are still in suspense. The 
last post brought us so bad an account, that we have reason to 
fear the worst. I should be very glad that mamma should 
get to town time enough to see her, because it might be a 
satisfaction to both, and dear grandmamma asked for her." 

Then the newspapers contain the following announcement : 
The Weekly Journal, or Saturday's Post, September 28, 1723. 
— " The Lady Russell, widow of Lord William Russell, that 
was beheaded, continues dangerously ill." 

October 5th. — " The Right Hon. The Lady Russell, relict 
of Lord William Russell, died on Sunday morning last, at 



246 LADY RACHAEL RUSSELL. 

five o'clock, aged eighty-six, and her corpse is to be carried to 
Chenies, in Buckinghamshire, to be buried with that of her 
lord." 

We need not dwell upon the incidents of her last hours. 
Silently she sank to sleep ; the troubles of her life were over, 
its storms and tempests all gone by :— 

•' They looked, she was dead, 
Her spirit had fled, 

Painless and pure as her own desire. 

The soul, undrest 
From its mortal vest. 

Had stepped in its car of heavenly fire ; 

And proved how bright, 
Are the worlds of light. 

Bursting at once upon the sight." 

The London Journal, of Saturday, October 12th, contains 
the following : — "On Tuesday morning last, the corpse of the 
Lady Russell, was carried from her house, in Bloomsbury 
Square, to its interment at Chenies, in Buckinghamshire." 

" Favour is deceitful, and beauty is vain, but a woman that 
feareth the Lord, she shall be praised. Give her of the fruits 
of her hands ; and let her own works praise her in the gateSo 
Strength and honour are her clothing." " Blessed are the dead 
that die in the Lord!" 



LADY GEORGIANA RUSSELL. 



Everything connected with the Russell family is interest- 
ing. The name has often proved a talisman in the popular 
cause, and the lines addressed to the present noble represen- 
tative of the house have repeatedly found an echo in the 
hearts of the English people. 

" When nobility comes to thee stamp'd with a seal, 
Far, far more ennobling than monarch e'er set, 
With the blood of thy race, offered up for the weal, 
Of a nation that swears by that martyrdom yet. 

Like the boughs of that laurel by Delphi's decree, 
Set apart for the Fane and the service divine. 

So the branches that spring from the old Russell tree 
Are by Liberty claimed for the use of her shrine." 

Lady Georgiana Russell, a lady eminently distinguished 
for her amiable qualities, has worthily held her proud position : 
for it is a proud thing to bear the name of Russell ; a noble 
thing to be called by the name of him who died for his 
country, a martyr and a patriot, and that of her whose 
heroism and unswerving rectitude have made her the model of 
her sex. 

Unlike the noble Lady Rachael, the subject of our sketch 
has pursued the even tenor of her way, undisturbed by any 
of those terrible calamities which befel her noble ancestress. 
Thank God we live in happier times. The days of absolu- 
tism are gone by. Liberty of speech, and liberty of the 



248 LADY GEORGHa'nA RUSSELL. 

press, are fruitful blessings, won by blood and toil, but won 
for us — a worthy and a noble prize. It is a pleasant thing to 
tell of a happy childhood, a peaceful education, the hopes and 
promises of womanhood ; the hopes realized, the promises ful- 
filled, the life of security and joy and peace, a beautiful 
summer's day deepening into a beautiful autumn — pleasanter 
far than to tell of death and disaster, of huge wrong- doing, 
of proud tyranny, noble resistance, patient endurance, a 
cloudy, stormy day, that ends in a dark and cheerless night ; 
and thankful should we be that in the majority of instances 
the former picture is that of these latter days. 

The life of Lady Georgiana Russell presents nothing of 
material interest, except that interest which attaches to a life 
well spent. . Her early days were devoted to the acquisition 
of those qualities which afterwards commended her to all — 
qualities which would have done honour to any station of life. 
And let us not forget that there are more allurements and 
temptations in the higher circles of society than in the daily 
routine of those who form the middle class. And when there 
is more to contend against, there is more virtue in victory. 
The high and the low are the most tempted. The antipodes 
are alike in this. Riches bring with them the danger of 
pride and pomp and show, to the neglect of the higher duties 
and responsibilities of life ; and poverty, ah, who but the 
poor can tell the temptations of the friendless and the needy ? 
Lady Georgiana Russell maintained at all times her position 
with that noble spirit which commended her to all with whom 
she in any way became connected. 




p5-iit»a It E I 



1 



Mi 






LADY HUNTINGDON. 



In the early days of Christianity women were found among 
the ablest supporters and the firmest adherents of the new 
faith. True, they did not occupy high places in the church, 
and they were not chosen publicly to declare the message of 
salvation ; but in th^ir private excellence, in the eloquence of 
daily life, they made known Him who came to raise the 
fallen and to save the lost, and, enrolled among the faithful 
ones, many a christian woman has left her martyr-name. It 
was with no ordinary feelings of gratitude that woman 
received the gospel message, and perused in the history of 
her Saviour's life the many marks of kindly remembrance 
with which the Lord from heaven blessed her sex. As to a 
woman the first promise of a Saviour was given, so to a 
woman His speedy advent was declared. From a woman 
Christ received the nurture of helpless infancy, and the love 
of woman followed Him from the manger to the cross. 
When He had not where to lay His head, women ministered 
unto Him of their substance ; when His own disciples were 
ignorant of His true character. He revealed himself to the 
woman of Samaria ; with the overflowing feelings of a grate- 
ful heart a woman broke an alabaster box and poured rich 
ointment on the Saviour's head ; and from the lips of Martha 
at Bethany came that noble confession of evangelical faith, 
" Thou art the Christ, the Son of God." When the multi- 
tude clamoured for His death a woman dared to lift up her 
voice in His favour ; and when derided and betrayed and for- 



250 LADY hun;tingdon. 

saken, woman clung to Hira still — ^the last at His cross, the 
first at His tomb. 

When all Judea was shaken, and the rulers took counsel to 
destroy the new faith — the religion of the Nazarene — the 
house of Mary, the mother of Martha, was chosen by the 
disciples as their place for social prayer. Dorcas exerted 
herself in works of christian benevolence ; Persis laboured 
much in the Lord ; Priscilla expounded the way of God more 
perfectly to Apollos ; Lydia had her heart opened to attend to 
the word ; Eunice and Lois transmitted the faith to the youthful 
Timothy ; and the good works of Tabitha showed forth her 
piety and zeal. 

" O woman ! though thy fragile form 

Bows, like the willow, to the storm, 

Yet, if the power of grace divine. 

Find in thy lowly heart a shrine ; 

Then, in thy very weakness strong. 

Thou wind'st thy noiseless path along, 

"Weaving thine influence with the ties 

Of sweet domestic charities, 

And softening haughtier spirits down 

By happy contact with thine own." 

And in modern, as well as in ancient times, the zeal and 
constancy of woman has done much, very much, in spreading 
the knowledge of the gospel of God. How many active, 
earnest, and successful preachers do we owe to a mother's 
teachings, and a mother's love ? The history of the church 
would present us with many Monicas ; mothers whose faith 
has never become weak ; who amid all the excesses of youth, 
and the errors of maturer years, have still believed that their 
prayers were heard, and had their hearts rejoiced at last by 
seeing the child of so many prayers and tears brought humble 
and penitent to the foot of the cross. 



LADY HUNTINGDON. 251 

" When the woman came from Tyre, 
And from Jesus, mercy sought. 
Though he granted her desire, 
Yet at first he answered not." 

How many, by their unobtrusive excellence and devoted 
piety, have been as beacon- lights to glory? The instances 
are not few, and are not far between. They shine brightly in 
the past ; they illumiaate our path even now. Deriving from 
religion her truest elevation, so does woman gain from it her 
mightiest influence. *' In proportion to the depth of her 
religious sense, woman adds to the force of her bodily and 
mental accomplishments. She is then in her proper place ; a 
jewel, set by God, in the ephod of the vestment of his church ; 
and is in a position which of all others brings out its intensity 
of light, or brilliancy of colour."* 

Among the noble women who have aided in the progress of 
the Gospel, by their private virtue, and their direct efforts, 
none stand more conspicuous than Lady Huntingdon. The 
narrative of her life affords another instance of what one can 
do for the benefit of all. 

She came of a noble family, and was born on the 24th of 
August, 1707. Her ancestral name was Shirley, and her 
father was the second Earl Ferrars. When she was nine 
years old, she lost a dear friend about her own age, and this 
very deeply affected her. She was a sensitive child, and this 
was the first time she had been brought into direct contact 
with death. To the m.ost philosophical there is something in 
death which awakens strange emotions. To the Christian, 
indeed, it is but the gate of glory, and yet it is the penalty of 
sin. But to a little child there is something wonderful, some- 
thing awful in the coldness and the silence of death. Lady 

* Evans, 



I 



2b2 LADY HUNTINGDON. 

Shirley looked upon the funeral, saw the body laid in the 
tomb, heard the solemn words which she so faintly understoodj 
about a sure and certain hope of joyful resurrection, and went 
home to think. Who can understand the thinkings of a child 
about death ? no power to comprehend its import, no faith to 
hang the tomb with garlands, but the sense of an ever-present 
power, a dread destiny, that lays the high and low together in 
the dust. 

But it seems that Lady Shirley had some notion of the 
things beyond the grave, the life to come, the never-ending 
life that has the day of death for its nativity. She thought 
of God. She began to pray, and who can tell how her prayers 
were heard in heaven, and whether, after all, these childish 
prayers were not answered in her after life ? 

In June, 1728, she was united in marriage to Lord Hun- 
tingdon. At that period she possessed a highly intelligent 
mind, a quick apprehension, a brilliant fancy, a retentive 
memory, a strong, clear understanding, and a sound judg- 
ment, much improved by reading, deep thought, and con- 
versation. She was of a devotional turn of mind. She 
searched the Scriptures daily. Her husband had but little 
sympathy with her piety, though he never interfered with her 
religious movements. He viewed her, from the first, as the 
greatest addition to his happiness, and was always attentive and 
affectionate. For the gay pleasures of the world the countess 
had no taste, she could find no happiness in them, she saw their 
folly, and despised their vanity, and found in works of active 
benevolence a higher and more ecstatic enjoyment. But all 
this time the countess was only an inquirer after truth. She 
did not understand the Gospel in all its beauty and freeness ; 
the notion that good deeds done would form an angel ladder 
up to heaven, and acquit the doer at the bar of God, was 



LADY HUNTINGDON. 253 

uppermost in her mind. The spirit of self-righteousness 
taught her to look within, to ponder her own ways, her own 
thoughts, her own feelings ; instead of looking out of self-— 
good self, and bad self, to Christ crucified. 

It was about this period that Wesley and Whitfield produced 
a great awakening of serious and evangelical religion. It '»7as 
time for a change. The hour had arrived, and the men were 
sent. In the open fields they preached the word to thousands 
of anxious listeners ; as in the days when Christianity was young, 
the poor had the gospel preached to them, and heard it gladly. 
But in these old days not only the poor received the word, and 
learnt to love the Lord, but some of those who held high rank 
in Palestine, and they of Caesar's household ; so, at the 
preaching of Wesley, and of Whitfield, even the nobility were 
willing listeners, and, among the rest, Lady Margaret Hastings, 
the sister of Lord Huntingdon. This lady became a follower 
of Jesus Christ, and was very faithful and aflPectionate in 
exhorting others to seek the salvation which the Gospel gives. 
One day, while conversing with the Countess of Huntingdon, 
she said, since she had known and believed on the Lord 
Jesus Christ, she had been as happy as an angel. 

It was a strong and powerful description of the happy 
feelings she enjoyed ; but not too strong, not too powerful for 
the idea which she intended to convey : a participator in the 
great salvation, — the news of which the angels brought; under- 
standing the height, and depth, and length, and breadth of those 
things which the angels desired to look into ; in the possession 
of the happy consciousness that she had passed from death 
unto life, and that the angels were ministering spirits sent 
forth to minister to her as an heir of salvation, — how could 
she but have these ecstatic and ennobling emotions ? The 
Countess of Huntingdon was deeply affected by her testimony, 

z 



254 LADY HUNTINGDON. 

To lier it seemed another message from heaven — a word of 
hope, and peace, and joy ; language of blessedness and glory, 
ringing, as it were, those two delightful synonyms, holiness 
is happiness, happiness is holiness. But though she heard, 
and was deeply affected by the testimony of her sister-in-law, 
her heart was not yet given to God. It needed other language, 
other messages to convince her of her own unworthiness with- 
out Christ, and the fulness that was to be found in Him. 
Sickness came. Sickness is a powerful persuader. Life 
itself is but a long dying, and with every struggle against 
disease " we taste the grave, and the solemnities of our own 
funerals. Every day's necessity calls for a reparation of that 
portion which Death fed on all night when we lay on his lap, 
and slept in his outer chambers."* We are usually more 
susceptible to impression when in a state of ill-health. 
Banished from the air of heaven, bound to the sick couch, cut 
off from the cheerful face of men, keeping house with danger 
and with darkness, the Countess of Huntingdon learnt to know 
God. That sickness taught her the precariousness of life, 
taught her to regard death with a quiet eye, gifted her with a 
fortitude mightier than the stoicism of the porch, and her soul 
sprang up, as the lark, to heaven, singing and rejoicing as it 
bathes its plumage in the intoxicating air. Astronomy took 
its rise among the Chaldean shepherds. Constant leisure 
upon those vast and level plains, enabled them to elevate their 
attention to the heavenly bodies : so the time left for contem- 
plation in our hours of sickness, and our necessary disengage- 
ment from the things of earth, tends to direct our thoughts to 
the science of heaven, and to Him who is the bright and 
morning star. 

• Jeremy Taylor. 



LADY HUNTINGDON. 255 

The Countess of Huntingdon was converted ; old things 
passed away, all things became new. 

No sooner had she recovered from her illness than she sent 
a kind message to John and Charles Wesley, to inform them 
that she was one with them. Her change of character was 
exhibited inher change of conduct. Her life and conversa- 
tion were not what they had formerly been. The countess 
was a Christian, and rightly understood the text — " Be not 
conformed to the world." Some there were who entreated 
Lord Huntingdon to interfere, and prevent his countess from 
becoming a " Methodist." The only thing he did was to send 
for his former tutor, Bishop Benson, to convince her respecting 
the unnecessary strictness of her sentiments and conduct. 
But the appeal of the mitred prelate was unavailing, and he 
left her in haste, bitterly repenting that he had ever ordained 
George Whitfield, to whose influence he attributed the 
" fanaticism " of the countess. To his remarks her ladyship 
replied, *' My lord, mark my words, when you are on your 
dying bed, that will be one of the few ordinations you will 
reflect upon with complacency." Her prediction was fulfilled, 
for when the prelate was near death, he sent ten guineas to 
Mr. Whitfield, and requested that he might be remembered in 
his prayers. 

So the countess joined herself to the Methodists. The first 
society of this interesting body was formed in 1738, in a 
small chapel in Fetter Lane, London ; a place of worship 
now occupied by the Moravians. These meetings were 
sneered at as novelties ; but they were of the good old 
fashioned sort, after the form and manner of those model 
meetings in the upper room at Jerusalem. They were enthu- 
siastic ; but though men are permitted to be enthusiastic in 
patriotism, in science, in art, in literature, and in a thousand 



25Q LADY HUNTINGDON. 

other things beside — it must have but little to do with 
religion. A great many Christian people are afraid of it ; 
afraid of it now, but still more afraid of it in the days of 
formalism when Whitfield and the Wesleys preached, and 
whole nights Were spent in the sanctuary, calling upon God. 

" Lord ~ and Lady Huntingdon attended these society 
meetings of the Methodists. Howell Harris, and Mr. 
Whitfield, often preached in Fetter Lane. The latter was 
just returned from America, where he had been proclaiming 
the Gospel to immense crowds, in the open air. His ministry 
excited no small degree of attention. Many of the churches 
in London were thrown open to him, persons of all ranks 
crowded to hear, and many, not only of the poor, but of the 
nobility, were converteu. Lord and Lady Huntingdon were 
his constant attendants, and their patronage of his ministry 
caused numbers of the gentry and aristocracy to follow their 
example. Instead of deeming the countess mad, they had the 
highest opinion of her prudence and judgment ; they knew 
that she would not countenance an insane enthusiast, or a 
heretic, and they went to hear the man who could attract and 
interest so distinguished a member of their own order ; and, 
generally speaking, one sermon, from the lips and heart of 
Whitfield, was quite sufficient to bring them a second time." 

The countess, by her own example, and frequent invitations, 
induced numbers to attend the ministry of the word. She 
thus became one of the most influential home missionaries 
the country ever saw. In the Gospel there is but little 
recorded of the Apostle Andrew, but this is told us, that he 
went and called his own brother Peter \ and how efficient a 
preacher Peter was, we all know. . Those who are the means 
of bringing others within the sound of the gospel have done 
great things, and in this way the early part of the life of the 
Countess of Huntingdon became eminently distinguished. 



LADY HUNTINGDON. 257 

But the countess was not of that class which secludes itself 
from the active stir of common life. She strove to make a 
bad world better, by cultivating the acquaintance and gaining 
the friendship, of those who had but small love for religion ; 
that by her conduct and her conversation she might interest 
them in those things which the Bible reveals. Around her 
flocked most of the literary characters, distinguished wits, and 
reigning beauties of the day. They loved and respected the 
countess, though they had no love for her piety ; and by 
happy contact, many learnt to know the truth. The poet 
Young was a frequent hearer of the Methodists, and an 
intimate friend of the countess. " The lady who thus 
laboured for the salvation of distinguished personages, never 
forgot the poor ; and her ministrations, and that of her chapt 
lains, were just as adapted for the cottage as for the saloon, 
or the parlour ; for the rude as for the learned, and for the 
learned, as for the rude." 

So great was the effect that Methodism was then pro- 
ducing, that Horace Walpole, in a letter to Sir Horace Mann, 
says : " If you ever think of returning to England, you must 
prepare yourself for Methodism ; I really believe by that 
time, it will be necessary : this sect increases as fast as 
almost any religious nonsense ever did. Lady Fanny Shirley 
has chosen this way of bestowing the dregs of her beauty, 
and Mr. Lyttleton* is very near making the same sacrifice of 
those various characters which he has worn." 

All sorts of strange rumours were afloat about the " new 
doctrine." Some people have away of attributing everything 
which they regard as harmful, to Rome. So Mr. Wesley 
was said to be a papist and a Jesuit. Popish priests, they 
said, were in his house, and that he corresponded with "bonnie 

* Afterwards Lord Lyttleton, - 

y2 



iJ 



258 LADY HUNTINGDON. 

prince Charlie." Charles Wesley was summoned before the 
magistrate at Wakefield, for praying that " God's banished 
ones might be restored," which he interpreted as referring to 
the exiled Stuarts, and for which Dogberry-like act, we of 
modern days should " write him down an ass ;" but his zeal and 
loyalty were in those times highly applauded. So excited, 
indeed, became the populace in some places, that they called 
out in the streets for Lady Huntingdon, and threatened to tear 
her to pieces if they could seize her person. The countess 
used all her influence at court to obtain a pledge from head 
quarters that the Methodists should not be molested. The 
following letter, is from Lord Cartaret, in reply to a remon- 
strance which Lady Huntingdon addressed to him as one of 
his majesty's principal secretaries of state : — 

"Madam — I laid your remonstrance before his Majesty the 
king. My royal master commands me to assure your lady- 
ship, that, as the father and protector of his people, he will 
suffer no persecution on account of religion ; and I am desired 
to inform all magistrates, to afford protection and countenance 
to such persons as may require to be protected in the con- 
scientious discharge of their religious observances. His 
majesty is fully sensible of your ladyship's attachment to the 
House of Hanover, and has directed me to assure you of his 
most gracious favour and kind wishes. 

I have the honour to be. Madam, your ladyship's 

Most obedient, humble servant, 
Cartaret." 

On one occasion, a Welsh magistrate, Sir Watkin William 
Wynn, turned persecutor, and fined the people for listening to 
the preaching of the Methodists. The countess having heard 
of the occurrence, laid the case before the government, and 
Sir Watkin was compelled to resto're all the fines he had ex- 



Id- 



LADY HUNTINGDON. 259 

torted. It says something for the liberality of the second 
George, that he would, upon no account, permit any persecu- 
tion to be exercised against these new dissenters, or rather, 
new revivalists. The Stuarts would have trembled at thirty 
thousand people, chiefly of the labouring classes, classes 
which modern statesmanship has designated " dangerous," as- 
sembling to listen to the preaching of Whitfield. But George 
knew too well that Christianity, which Whitfield preached, while 
it taught men to fear God, bid them also honour the king. 

All this time Lady Huntingdon had called herself a member 
of the established church ; but still it was not in the modern 
acceptation of the word, and she was in truth far more of a 
dissenter, than many of the professed nonconformists of our 
own time. She had a higher standard than that of church 
creeds and articles of belief ; she had higher authority than 
church councils, and ecclesiastical canons, and neither she, nor 
the ministers who united themselves to her party, conformed 
to any more of the creeds and rites of the state establishment 
than they believed to be in accordance with the sacred volume. 
Parochial boundaries they disregarded — wherever they pleased 
they preached ; in the open air, on the green hill side, in 
the stirring, bustling market, accounting all places sacred, and 
all hours holy. 

One of her biographers says : — 

" The life of Lady Huntingdon is almost a biography of the 
real vital church of her day. She was a centre of attraction 
to all. In fact, there was hardly a distinguished individual 
in the schools of science or literature ; among artists or pro- 
fessional men ; in the church, or belonging to dissenters, but 
shared her hospitality, or enjoyed her friendship. Her circle 
was, without exception, the most imposing, honourable, and 
splendid, that the world has ever seen. In her drawing-room 



260 LADY HUN^TINGDON. 

you met with nobles, statesmen, bishops, clergymen, dissen- 
ters, men and women of learning, science, and wit. And 
what was best of all, she attracted these various personages, 
for the sole purpose of doing their souls good, and of winning 
them to Christ. Her religion, her spirituality, her particular 
views of Divine truth, were never thrown aside in the presence 
of her visitors, nor to meet the prejudice of any from whom 
she differed. She and they could examine opposing creeds 
without quarrelling, losing their temper or mutual respect. 
She formed an evangelical alliance without the restrictions, 
the contracted creed, or other imperfections of modern times. 
You might moot any question in religion, without being re- 
minded that searching the scriptures or investigating truth 
were prohibited. She loved to bring those who differed from 
each other together, and was not afraid to place christian men 
and women in juxta-position with the wit, the scoffer, or the 
infidel. Whitfield, and Bolingbroke, Watts, Doddridge, Dr. 
Gibbon, Dr. Gifford, Dr. Gill, Risdon Darracott, and a host of 
others, distinguished for seraphic piety, or for no religion at 
all, met in her saloon, or shared her correspondence. In 
writing to the Rev. Risdon Darracott, she says, ' We should 
rejoice to see you amongst us ; I hope nothing will prevent it 
if convenient to you. All cfospel ministers it is our highest 
honour and happiness to serve, and no denomination do we 
ever reject.' And the heart that dictated these words, reasoned 
with Bolingbroke, enjoyed the friendship of Chesterfield, 
laboured to convert Shuter, the comedian, and induced Chat- 
ham and Fox to come and listen to the gospel from the lips 
of Whitfield." 

And it must be borne in mind, that the countess was in a 
very delicate and precarious state of health. Yet she never 
grew weary in well-doing. Wherever she went she laboured, 



LADY HUNTINGDON. 261 

scattering the seed which afterward sprung up and brought 
forth much fruit. It was not necessary to live, but it was 
necessary to live nobly. The work in which she was engaged 
was far dearer to her than health of body. So satisfied was 
Whitfield with the judgment of the countess in religious mat- 
ters, that he" wished her to become the leader of his societies. 
There is a letter extant addressed to her ladyship from Whit- 
field, in which he says : — " A leader is wanting ; this honour 
has been put upon your ladyship by the Great Head of the 
church." The wish of Whitfield was acceptable to the peo- 
ple, for by this time the societies had become very numerous, 
and various chapels and meeting-houses had been erected. 
On the countess presenting a request, when suffering from 
bodily infirmities, for the prayers of the friends at the Taber- 
nacle, thousands joined in singing the following lines : — 

** Gladly we join to pray for those, 

Who rich with worldly honours shine ; 

Who dare to own a Saviour's cause, 
And in that hated cause to join : 

Yes, we would praise thee that a few 

Love thee, though rich and noble too. 

Uphold this star in thy right hand — 
Crown her endeavours with success ; 

Among the great ones may she stand, 
A witness of thy righteousness ; 

Till many nobles join thy train, 

And triumph in the Lamb once slain." 

It is not our business in this place to enter into the reli- 
gious controversies which agitated the newly formed body. 
Whitfield in his doctrine followed Calvin and the Puritans ; 
Wesley preached against election, and in favour of perfection. 



I 



262 LADY HUNTINGDON. 

A great effort was made to unite the Methodist body, but the 
effort was unavailing, and Wesley separated himself and party 
from the Whitfieldites. Not long after this event, a circum- 
stance occurred which drew fresh additions to the Methodist 
body, and aroused new interest in their success. London 
was shaken by an earthquake. Scepticism trembles before 
the awful phenomena of nature. Tower Hill, Moorfields, and 
Hyde Park were crowded with men, women, and children ; 
the chapels of the Methodists were thronged. A fanatical 
soldier proclaimed that London would be swallowed up. 
Popular credulity believed the report. Dense masses of peo- 
ple congregated in the fields and open places ; and in the dark- 
ness of night, Whitfield, with more than usual pathos and 
solemnity, proclaimed to the trembling thousands, the terrors 
of the last day. The time, the place, the circumstances, all 
added power to his sermon, and numerous additions were made 
to the sect of which he was one of the founders. 

The interest which Lady Huntingdon still took in the suc- 
cess of the revival, is evidenced by many leters and papers of 
the period. To those who preached she was a kind and 
gracious friend, and Whitfield, writing to Lady Delitz, says, 
" Good Lady Huntingdon goes on acting the part of a mother 
in Israel, more and more. For a day or two she has had 
five clergymen under her roof, which makes her ladyship look 
like a good Archbishop, with his chaplains around him. Her 
house is a Bethel to us in the ministry — it looks like a college. 
We have the sacrament every morning, heavenly conversation 
all day, and preach at night." Like Priscilla of old, she 
instructed many an Apollos in the ways of the Lord, more 
perfectly. 

Frederick, Prince of Wales, father of George IIL, was con- 
sidered very favourably disposed toward the Methodists, and 



LADY HUNTINGDON. 263 

entertained a very high respect for the Countess of Hunting- 
don. One day, at court, the prince said to a lady of fashion, 
Lady Charlotte Edwin, " Where is Lady Huntingdon, that she 
so seldom visits the circle ?" Lady Charlotte, replying with 
a sneer, said, " I suppose praying with the beggars." The 
prince shook his head, saying, "Lady Charlotte, when I am 
dying, I think I shall be happy to seize the skirt of Lady 
Huntingdon's mantle, to lift me up with her to heaven." 

But the widowed countess, for Lord Huntingdon was dead, 
had many hard and bitter trials. It was a terrible thing to 
hear that her brother, the Earl Ferrars, had committed murder ; 
that while his sister was exerting all her direct influence to 
make a bad world better, and exhibiting by her own exemplary 
conduct the loveliness of Christianity, that he should lift his 
guilty hand, and brand his forehead with the mark of Cain. 
The circumstances of the case are well known. Johnson, the 
earl's steward, having incurred the displeasure of his em- 
ployer, he resolved to take away his life. Not suspecting the 
intention of the peer, the attentive steward obeyed a notice which 
summoned him to a meeting, and was shot by his inhuman 
master. On the trial of the perpetrator of this crime, 
witnesses were produced in support of his insanity ; but it 
appearing to the court, that, at the time of the murder his 
judgment was cool, and his intellect unimpaired, the plea of 
insanity was disallowed, and he was condemned to death. 
At the earnest solicitation of his friends, the king respited the 
execution for a fortnight, but, with a laudable impartiality, he 
steadily refused to exercise his royal clemency. He even 
refused to grant the request of the prisoner to suffer in the 
Tower instead of at Tyburn. So the brother of the Countess 
of Huntingdon was hanged as a common felon ; behaving in 
the last scene of his life, with composure and intrepidity. His 



264 LADY HUNTINGDON. 

body was not exempted from the ignominy of dissection ; but 
i . was afterwards delivered to his friends for interment. 

Neither bodily nor family affliction could deaden the zeal 
of the countess. She more and more devoted her whole life 
to the prosperity of the cause with which she had become 
identified. She fixed her thoughts on the future. All the 
great and good of the earth have given us examples of the 
cultivation of this faculty. It is, indeed, at the foundation of 
all true greatness of mind, which consists in acting with great 
views, from great motives, to accomplish great purposes. 
After the death of Whitfield, the countess became the leader 
of the sect which still bears her name, and which boasts among 
its advocates and adherents some of the ablest preachers, and 
most consistent Christians, which the world has seen. 

Her life was one of utility. Without any thing very great or 
very splendid, which called for the world's applause, she 
effected one of the mightiest revolutions of modern times. 
The beneficial results of her life cannot be estimated — but is 
it not written — " They that be wise shall shine as the light, 
and they that turn many to righteousness, as the stars, for 
ever and ever?" 

She died on the 17th of June, 1791. 



MRS. HEMANS. 



Some people have no love for poetry. But these are your 
ungracious, gruff, quarrelsome, hard-hearted, thick-headed, 
muddle-brained folk, who have no more notion of true beauty 
than Bottom, in the fairy fancy, has of music : — 

" Will you have any music, my sweet love ?" 
" Let's have the tongs and the bones." 

George II. said, he " haded poedry, and bainding too." 
And we have thousands and thousands of re-issues of the 
Hanoverian monarch, in our own day. They can understand 
a steam-engine, or a drilling-plough, or a street-sweeping 
machine, or an electric telegraph, or a folding apparatus, or 
any thing that has evident practical utility for its end ; but 
they do not understand, and they do not care to understand, 
the higher and more ennobling powers which man possesses. 
It was once objected to the " Paradise Lost," that it did not 
prove any thing ; and, looked at in a syllogistic point of view, 
it certainly does not. One thing, however, it does prove, 
that man has a mighty power within him, which is far greater, 
far nobler, far more exalting, than all the mechanical skill in 
the world. "Poetry," says Aristotle, *' is imitation." "It 
is," says Johnson, " the art of pleasing." " It is," says 
Elliott, " impassioned truth." " But," says a modern au- 
thor, " were we asked the question — what is poetry ? we 
should reply, (not as a definition, but a description,) it is 
love — pure, refined, insatiable affection for the beautiful forms 

A A 



I 



2()6 MRS. H*EMANS. 

of this material universe, for the beautiful affections of the 
human soul, for the beautiful passages of the history of the 
past, for the beautiful prospects which expand before us in the 
future : such love burning to passion, attired in imagery, and 
speaking in music, is the essence and the soul of poetry. 
'Tis this which makes personification the lips of poetry. The 
poet looks upon nature, not with the philosopher, as composed 
of certain abstractions, certain * cold material laws ;' but he 
breathes upon them, and they quicken into personal life, and 
become objects, as it were, of personal attachment. The 
winds, with him, are not cold currents of air, they are mes- 
sengers, they are couriers — the messengers of destiny — the 
couriers of God ; the rainbow is not a mere prismatic effect 
of light, but to the poet, in the language of the son of Sirach, 
' it encompasses the heaven with a glorious circle, and the 
hands of the Most High have bended it ;' the lightning is not 
simply an electric discharge, 'tis a barbed arrow of vengeance, 
it is winged with death ; the thunder is not so much an ele- 
mental uproar as it is the voice of God ; the stars are not so 
much distant worlds, as they are eyes, looking down on men 
with intelligence, sympathy, and love : the ocean is not a dead 
mass of waters, it is ' a golden mirror to the Almighty's 
form ;' the sky is not, to the poet, ' a foul and pestilent con- 
gregation of vapours,' it is a magnificent canopy, ' fretted 
with golden fires ;' nay, to his anointed eye, every blade of 
grass lives, every flower has its sentiment, every tree its 
moral, and — 

' Visions, as poetic eyes avow, 
Hang on each leaf, and cling to every bough.' " 

All this has nothing to do with ledgers and day-books, and 
cannot be sold by auction, and never rises nor falls with the 



MRS. HEMANS. 267 

funds, but it is man's indefeasible possession — a noble gift 
from heaven, a piece of *' divinity that stirs within us,'' an 
earnest of better things to come — a glorious birthright, which 
is ofttimes sold for a mess of pottage. Woe for us if there 
were nothing in the world hut the hard practicalities of common 
life ; woe for us if God had made the world useful without 
beauty, if he had only bestowed upon us those things which 
daily necessities demand, and only given us those faculties 
which could comprehend wheat from thistles, and given us the 
ability to understand, with the vulpine sagacity of reynard, 
where the geese lay. 

But there is another class who, without tabooing poetry, 
taboo the poetess. A man may write rhyme if he will, and 
clothe the palpable and unseen with golden exhalations, but 
woman is out of her element when her pen becomes the pen 
of a ready writer, and she begins to pour forth the high 
yearnings of her own impassioned soul. Some people are 
disposed to laugh at the poetess — they regard her as a species 
of nondescript animal, spoilt for household duties, and unfit 
for anything beside — they pronounce against her the terrible 
anathema of "blue stocking." But the history of literature 
presents us, and especially modern literature, with some of 
the most gifted, and highly-talented poetesses — women in 
whose hearts the spirit of chivalry, and romance, and gushing 
poetry, have taken up their dwelling, and high among them 
stands, that most prosaic cognomen — Dorothea Browne — a 
lady far better known by her wedded name, " Mrs. Hemans." 
She was born in Duke Street, Liverpool, on the 25th of 
September, 1794. Her ,mother was the descendant of a 
Venetian family, and still treasured a love for that silent city 
of the sea. Her father was an Irishman. She was a beauti- 
ful child, beautiful in person, and beautiful in mind, approach- 



»bO MRS. Uemans. 

ing very near the Athenian notion of perfection — a beautiful 
soul in a beautiful body. When she was five years old, her 
father failed in business, and removed from Liverpool to North 
Wales. Originally possessing a highly poetical temperament, 
her love of the beautiful was increased by her new home. It 
v/as an ancient mansion, picturesque and spacious, " with more 
gable ends than a lazy man would care to count on a summer's 
day." Wandering through the old rooms, or looking out 
toward the vast expanse of ocean, or up toward the chain of 
rocky hills, or gathering wild flowers in the green pastures — 
there was enough to suggest poetic thoughts to a less poetic 
temperament than hers. With her long wavy golden hair, 
her light and graceful figure, her brilliant complexion, and 
her bright eyes, she wandered like a little fairy in that beau- 
tiful district, reading the lessons which trees, and fruits, and 
flowers, and craggy rocks, and mighty waves, all taught, 
before she could read the written book of man^s devising. 
Nature was very dear to her. There was a music sweeter 
than that of palaces in the mountain wind, and a splendour in 
the verdure, and a glory in the foliage never equalled by the 
chisel or the loom. She loved all nature with intensest love — 
every leaf that quivered on the bough, and every dew-drop 
that sparkled on the grass. 

And when she learned to read our written literature, it 
opened to her a new world of enchantment and delight. She 
would read aloud ; was fond of reciting poems and fragments 
of plays — used to elimb an apple-tree to enjoy Shakespeare 
in security. People used to say " that child is not made for 
happiness, her colour comes and goes too fast." She heard 
the remark, and it stuck in her breast like a barbed arrow. 
She was very delicate, very sensitive, and fearing the pain that 
it might occasion, refused to be ear-cringed ; yet she loved to 



MRS. HEMANS. 269 

dwell on the harrowing scenes of the great bard, to read of 
the dismal fate of Desdemona ; of the three w^eird sisters, who, 
in foretelling, themselves created the bloody destiny of Macbeth; 
of Hamlet, with his philosophic vein ; and of Titania, under 
the greenwood trees, her ringlets dewy with the kisses of the 
flowers. 

When very young, she composed the following fairy song. 
It is a perfect gem of its kind : — - 

" All my life is joy and pleasure," 
Sportive as my tuneful measure, 
In the rose's cup I dwell, 
Balmy sweets perfume my cell ; 
My food, the crimson luscious cherry, 
And the vine's luxurious berry ; 
The nectar of the dew is mine — 
Nectar from the flowers divine ; 
And when I join the fairy band. 
Lightly tripping hand in hand, 
By the moonlight's quivering beam, 
In concert with the dashing stream. 
Then my music leads the dance. 
When the gentle fays advance ; 
And oft their numbers on the green 
Lull to rest the fairy Queen." 

When she was fourteen years old, a volume of her poems 
was collected and published, and had great success. Thus 
passed away her girlhood — in devotion to poetry — poetry 
that was something far higher and nobler than the jingling of 
rhymes, and which really deserved the name. 

In the year 1812, Dorothea Browne, then eighteen years old, 
married a Captain Hemans, of the fourth regiment, but the 
union was an unhappy one. After becoming the mother of 
four or five children, a separation was determined upon ; and 

A A 2 



270 MRS. HEMANS. 

for seven or eight years after she was thrown on her own 
resources she poured forth her poetry with a copiousness 
which would have done honour to Byron or Scott» Poetry 
was her world, and poetry of a very high order. " Wallace," 
'* Dartmoor," " Modern Greece," " The Sceptic," " Tales and 
Historic Scenes," " The Records of Woman," " The Forest 
Sanctuary," " The Hebrew Mother," " The Voice of Spring," 
" Tlie Welsh Melodies," " The Siege of Valencia," followed 
each other in rapid succession. Her dramatic poem of the 
" Vespers of Palermo," was unsuccessful on the stage. It is 
not the best poet that makes the best dramatist. Her lyrics 
are very beautiful, and are almost perfect of their kind. What 
can be more solemn, more touching, more sweet, and yet more 
lofty, than her Song of Night ? 



" I come, with every star ; 
Making thy streams, that in their noon- day track, 
Give but the moss, the reed, the lily back, 

Mirrors of worlds afar. 

I come, with mightier things ! 
Who calls me silent ? I have many tones 
The dark skies thrill with low mysterious moans, 

Borne on my sweeping wings. 

I come, with all my train ; 
Who calls me lonely ? Hosts around me tread : 
The intensely bright, the beautiful, the dead — 

Phantoms of heart and brain, 

I that, with soft control, 
Shut the dim violet, hush the woodland song — 
I am the avenging one ! — the armed, the strong — 

The searcher of the soul ! 



MRS. HEMANS. 271 

I, that shower dewy light 
Through slumbering leaves, bring storms ! the tempest birth 
Of memory, thought, remorse. Be holy, Earth. 

I am the solemn Night I 



Mrs. Heifians had no great liking for what we call " the 
world." Soirees and routs had no charm for her. In 1828, 
she went to reside at Wavertree, a village near her birth-place. 
This spot she selected because of the facilities which it offered 
for the education of her boys, and because of its calm retire- 
ment. She loved the society where none intrude. The fol- 
lowing year she visited Scotland, and, being recognized at an 
hotel where she put up, a basket of flowers was presented to 
her — a bit of Nature — a touching and delicate compliment. 
She was kindly greeted by Sir Walter Scott, and, in company 
with that distinguished man, " strolled in the Rhymours Glen, 
got wet feet in the haunted burn, tore her gown in making 
her way through thickets of wild roses, stained her gloves 
with wood strawberries, and had her face scratched with the 
branch of a rowan tree." 

In her whole life there was the exhibition of the same 
spirit ; doubtless she would have disappointed the herd of 
spectators, for she did not walk the path of life in the gar- 
ments of the stage ; she had not the shrewd and worldly 
spirit to dazzle the multitude, and was skilled in no arts, save 
that of composition. 

In the summer of 1830 she visited Wordsworth ; and with 
regard to him — whose poetry she had ever idolized, sanctify- 
ing, as it does, the commonest incidents of human life — she 
says, " There is a daily beauty in his life, which is in such 
lovely harmony with his poetry, that I am thankful to have 
witnessed and felt it. He gives me a good deal of his society ; 



272 MRS. ifEMANS. 

reads to me, walks with me, leads my pony when I ride ; and 
I begin to talk with him as with a sort of paternal friend. The 
whole of this morning he kindly passed in reading to me a 
great deal from Spenser, and afterwards his own * Laodamia,' 
my favourite, ' Tintern Abbey,' and many of those noble 
sonnets, which you likewise so much enjoy. Yesterday even- 
ing he walked beside as I rode on a long and lovely mountain 
path, high above Grasmere Lake. I was much interested by 
his shewing me, carved deep into the rock, as we passed, the 
initials of his wife's name, inscribed there, many years ago, 
by himself ; and the dear old man, like Old Mortality, renews 
them from time to time. I could scarcely help exclaiming, 
Esto Perpetuar* 

Some time afterwards, she took up her residence at Dublin, 
but her health was becoming seriously impaired. All her life 
long she had cherished a devotional spirit ; but her religion 
became of a more decided and elevated character as she drew 
near her end. There is a closer and more intimate connexion 
between religion and poetry than we commonly suppose. The 
essence of both is the same. From the Bible, Mrs. Hemans 
gained her noblest inspiration, as well as her surest comfort. 
Her poetic career was closed with a Sabbath sonnet, which she 
dictated from her dying bed : — 

" How many blessed groups this hour are bending, 

Through England's primrose meadow-paths, their way 
Toward spire and tower, 'midst shadowy elms ascending, 

"Whence the sweet chimes proclaim the hallow'd day I 
The halls, from old heroic ages grey, 

Pour their fair children forth ; and hamlets low, 
With whose thick orchard-blooms the soft winds play, 

Send out their inmates in a happy flow, 
Like a freed vernal stream. I may not tread 

With them those pathways — to the feverish bed 



MRS. HEMANS. 273 

Of sickness bound. Yet, Oh, my God ! I bless 
Thy mercy, that with Sabbath peace hath fill'd 

My chastened heart, and all its throbbings stiird 
To one deep calm of lowliest thankfulness." 

A short time before her death, the symptoms of dropsy, 
which had formerly appeared, began to abate. Then came 
hectic fever, then delirium, then death. She was lamented 
sincerely, deeply, by all who knew her, for her gentle loving 
spirit had ever attracted and never repelled those who sought 
her aid or her counsel. 



i 



MES. BUNYAK 



\'^>: 



The poet whispers to his muse, " Posterity shall know 
thee." And it is not only poets who have to look to the 
future, to generations yet unhorn, for a fair impartial criticism. 
Public men, politicians, preachers, and others are often mis- 
judged by their contemporaries. Never was man more mis- 
judged than John Bunyan. He was a tinker, and the son of 
a tinker, originally of gipsy origin, associating with the 
lowest of the people, in an age of gross popular ignorance, and 
connected with a sect exclusively exclusive ; and which thought 
but lightly of all human learning. Yet he is the author of a 
book for all people and for all time ; a book more lasting than 
the story of the wars of Troy. Of Bunyan how truly may it 
be said, *' Though thou hast lain amongst the pots, yet shalt 
thou be as the wings of a dove, covered with silver, and her 
feathers with yellow gold." But for a long, long season, Bunyan 
was a bye-word. Cowper found it necessary to suppress his 
name while passing a high eulogium on his work. 



" Ingenious dreamer, in whose well-told tale 
Sweet fiction and sweet truth alike prevail, 
I name thee not, lest so despised a name 
Should move a sneer at thy deserved fame !' 



Yet over all obstacles the genius of Bunyan has prevailed ; 
it has risen higher than mountains of ignorance, and walked 



MRS. BUNYAN. 275 

upon the troubled waters of contumely, till the mountains have 
become as the plain, and the troubled waters still. And now 
men look at his book as it deserves to be looked at, and 
regard his genius as it should be regarded, — albeit the man 
was once a travelling tinker. 

Of the " Pilgrim's Progress," Coleridge says, " This won- 
derful book, is one of the very few books which may be read 
over repeatedly, at different times, and each time with a new 
and different pleasure. I read it once as a theologian ; and 
let me assure you that there is great theological acumen in the 
work ; — once with devotional feelings ; — and once as a poet : 
I could not have believed beforehand that Calvinism could be 
painted in such exquisitely delightful colours. I know of no 
book, the Bible excepted, as above all comparison, which I, 
according to my judgment and experience, could so safely 
recommend as teaching and enforcing the whole saving truth, 
according to the mind that was in Christ Jesus, as the 
* Pilgrim's Progress.' It is, in my conviction, incomparably 
the best summa theologice evangelicce ever produced by a 
writer not miraculously inspired. ... I hold John Bunyan to 
be a man of incomparably greater genius than any of them 
(the Divines), and to have given a far truer and more edify- 
ing picture of Christianity. His ' Pilgrim's Progress' seems 
to be a complete reflection of Scripture, with none of the rub- 
bish of theologians mixed up with it. ... I have been always 
struck by its piety ; I am now, having read it through again, 
after a long interval, struck equally, or even more, by its 
profound wisdom." 

Lord Campbell, in his " Lives of ihe Chief Justices," says, 
referring to the imprisonment of Bunyan ; " Being cut off 
from the external world, he communed with bis own soul, and 
inspired by Him who touched Elijah's hallowed lips with fire. 



276 MRS. BUNYAN. 

he composed the noblest of allegories, the merit of which was 
first discovered by the lowly, but which is now lauded by the 
most refined critics ; and which has done more to awaken 
piety, and to enforce the precepts of Christian morality, than 
all the sermons which have been published by all the prelates 
of the Anglican Church." 

** The happy idea," says Montgomery, " of representing 
his story under the similitude of a dream, enabled him to 
pourtray, with all the liveliness of reality, scenes which passed 
before him. It makes the reader himself, like the author, a 
spectator of all that occurs ; thus giving him a personal 
interest in the events, an individual sympathy for the actors 
and sufferers." 

In Macaulay's review of Southey's life of Bunyan, that 
distinguished man says :* — " The characteristic peculiarity of 
the ' Pilgrim's Progress' is, that it is the only work of its 
kind which possesses a strong human interest. Other alle- 
gories only amuse the fancy. It is not so with the 'Pilgrim's 
Progress.' That wonderful book, while it obtains admiration 
from the most fastidious critics, is loved by those who are too 
simple to admire it. In the wildest parts of Scotland it is 
the delight of the peasantry. In every nursery the ' Pilgrim's 
Progress' is a greater favourite than ' Jack the Giant Killer.' 
J^very reader knows the straight and narrow path as well as 
he knows the road in which he has gone backward and forward 
a hundred times. This is the highest miracle of genius, — 
that things which are not should be as though they were, — 
that the imaginations of one mind should become the personal 
recollections of another, — and this miracle the tinker has 

wrought The style of Bunyan is delightful to every 

reader, and invaluable, as a study, to every person who wishes 
to obtain a wide command over the English language. The 



~_i 



MRS. BUNYAN. 277 

vocabulary is the vocabulary of the common people 

For magnificence, for pathos, for vehement exhortation, for 
subtle disquisition, for every purpose of the poet, the orator, 
and the divine, this homely dialect, the dialect of plain work- 
ing men, was perfectly sufficient Though there 

were many clever men in England during the latter half of 
the seventeenth century, there were only two great creative 
minds : one of those minds produced the ' Paradise Lost,' 
the other the * Pilgrim's Progress !' " 

Dr. Eadcliffe termed the book a Phcenix in a cage. Lord 
Kaimes declared, that it was composed in a style enlivened 
like that of Homer, by a mixture of the dramatic and nar- 
rative. Johnson took the little daughter of Bishop Percy 
upon his knee, and asked her how she liked the Pilgrim's 
Progress, and on her saying that she had not read it, the 
doctor rejoined, " Then I would not give one farthing for you." 
Mr. Grainger says, it is one of the most ingenious books in 
the language ; and passing over a host of distinguished names 
we add last the words of an American critic : "This extraor- 
dinary work is like a painting exhibited by fire-light. The 
common reader sees it by day. To the christian (the actual 
pilgrim) it is a glorious transparency ; and the light that 
shines through it, and gives its incidents such life, its colours 
such depth, and the whole scene such a surpassing glory — is 
light from eternity — the message from heaven." 

So justice has at length been done to John Bunyan and his 
book. But justice has not been rendered to his wives. His 
first wife was a woman of great excellence, and the second, of 
whom we have now to speak, has been described as worthy of 
the first. Some few things, however, about his first wife may 
not be out of place, as she is taken as the standard by which 
the second is compared. 

B B 



278 MRS. BUNYAN. 

When John Bunyan was still young, not more than 
eighteen or nineteen years old, a wild, reckless, scape-grace 
fellow, it was thought by the few friends that he had, that by 
changing his condition to the married state, he might be 
induced to reform, and they therefore urged him to take the 
step " as a seasonable and comfortable advantage." Tupper 
^ays : — 

" Marriage is a figure and an earnest of holier things unseen, 
And reverence well becometh the symbol of dignity and glory." 
/ 

And this is true. But marriage in many cases is only the 
beginning of sorrows. Marriage is a great lottery, and too 
often blanks are drawn, or something worse than blanks. 
But John Bunyan drew a prize, a veritable prize, a valuable 
prize, a worthy prize, — a good wife. It was a happy thing 
for him, a high and noble privilege. She was very virtuous, 
loving, obedient, and obliging, a keeper-at-home ; one who 
had been born of good, honest, godly parents, who had 
instructed her, as well as they were able, in the ways of truth 
and holiness. Now some good-intentioned people would 
have rated at John's folly and mischievous habits, but his 
quiet. God-fearing wife, did nothing of the sort. She did not 
constitute herself his censor ; she felt that it would be wrong 
to do so, but with the winsome lovingness of her own loving 
heart she strove to win him from the path of sin. She had 
a dower. No costly robes, no current coin, no stately 
mansion, no broad acres, no flocks nor herds, but two plain 
books, simple books, worth more than all the rest together. 
These were the " Plain Man's Pathway to Heaven," and 
*' The Practice of Early Piety." Sometimes on a winter's 
night when in their cottage home the fire roared and blazed 
and crackled br'ght and loud, she would induce John to sit 



MRS. BUNYAN. 279 

beside the fire and spend the evening at home instead of in 
the ale-house, *and to beguile the time would read to him out 
of those old books. And as he hearkened to her voice his 
spirit was stirred within him. Moodily John would listen, 
and there was a combat going on in his breast, like %ne of 
the fierce struggles in the Roman games. John had learned 
to read in his early years, but dissipation had driven learning 
far away. Once he had an inclination for the beautiful, the 
good and the true, but evil communications had corrupted his 
good manners. There was something loveable in John, some- 
thing Idveable in his wife, and he became her pupil, as if he 
had been a child. Strange it was that the ringleader of sports 
and impiety should be thus subdued. It was the conquest of 
Jove ; a triumph which none but a wife, and that a wife com- 
bining prudence and sweetness, could have achieved. It must 
have been no easy matter to keep John Bunyan by her side, 
#hile the roysterers on the village green were playing at'^trap, 
and his own bat and ball were lying dry in the chimney corner ; 
no easy matter to detain him there when the shouts went up, 
and the loud laugh, and the game went on so merrily, when 
the bright sunshine fell on the group, and the bells of Elstow 
rang a merry peal. 

Something there was in the smile of his wife better to John 
Bunyan than the loud laugh of the roysterers, something in 
the tones of her voice sweeter than the bells of Elstow, some- 
thing more entertaining in the " Plain Man's Pathway to 
Heaven" than in the merriest game of trap-ball that ever 
man yet played. Under the benign influence of her teaching, 
the character of the man was changed. It was a long struggle, 
and a very hard one — like the throes of a dying gladiator — 
before John Bunyan became an altered man ; but it was done 
at last ; and then the struggle within was changed for a struggle 



280 MRS. BTJNYAN. 

without. At this time we lose sight of his first wife, and his 
second wife stands beside him in his days of calumny and 
reproach. 

It was an union of two believers ; they had one hope, one 
faith, one desire, one course of life, one service of God, in 
common the one with the other. To say that this second 
wife was worthy of the first is saying much ; to say that she 
fell not short of Lady Eussell, and this has been said, is 
saying still more, yet saying nothing but the truth. 

Bunyan was charged with neglecting his parish church ; 
once indeed, he had entertained a superstitious reverence for 
all that belonged to the church ; the very stones were holy, 
and he venerated the priest and the clerk, and all that per- 
tained to the place ; but those days were gone by, and he had 
now set about the business of his life. It was urged that he 
had attended private meetings, and, alas for the tinker, that 
he had preached ! He was accused of this at Bedford, and 
owned it ; dared in the presence of the judges to confess that 
he, poor, simple, un-ordained layman-tinker as he was, had 
dared to whisper the gospel message ; dared, unauthorised, to 
preach Christ ! More than this, he even defended his conduct 
as fearlessly as John and Peter of old. 

Mrs. Bunyan loved her lord, not as the first had loved him. 
There was a deeper and sincerer trust in him ; for to her he 
had ever been the Christian and the Evangelist, to her he had 
spoken of the deep things of God, and with her love there was 
mingled the strongest esteem. With no common interest had 
she listened to hira, at these private meetings, when he had 
expounded the word of God ; deeply had she felt the earnest 
impassioned appeals which he made ; never had the Gospel 
seemed such good news to her as when it flowed from the 
lips of John Bunyan ; upon him she rested, to him she looked, 



-:.i 



MRS. BUNYAN. 281 

and every blow that fell on him, fell with double force on her. 
She was young but not inexperienced, simple but not untaught, 
and there was within her a deep and intense love. She was 
to him a faithful wife, and to his motherless little ones became 
a mother. "With indignation she listened to the coarse jests 
of the Judges, as Bunyan defended the cause he had adopted. 
"Who is your God," asked one, "is it Beelzebub ?" 
" Surely," said another, " he is possessed with a devil." 
She heard him sentenced to three months' imprisonment, 
and listened to the threat — " At the three months' end, if you 
do not submit to go to church, and hear divine service, and 
leave your preaching, you must be banished the realm ; and 
if you be found to come over again, without special leave 
from the king, you must be stretched by the neck for it." 

To stretch a man by the neck for preaching the Gospel 
seems rather a hard case ; but it was characteristic of the 
" good old times." 

From that day, Mrs. Bunyan determined to employ every 
means for the purposes of obtaining her husband's release. 
Undaunted by " principalities and powers," she presented a 
petition to the judges at the assizes, that he might be tried, 
and that his case might be taken impartially into consideration. 
Judge Hale was the first to whom she presented it, and he 
received it very mildly, telling her that he was willing to do 
her and her husband all the good he could, but he feared that 
would be none. 

Next day she threw another petition into the carriage of 
Justice Twisden, who, when he saw her, " snapt her up," 
saying that there was nothing for her husband but continued 
imprisonment, except he would promise to preach no more. 
At the coronation she hoped that he would be released, but 
the judges gave it as their opinion that it were better he should 

B B 2 



I' H I 



282 MRS. BUNYAN. 

remain in gaol, unless he recanted, So again Mrs. Banyan 
appealed to Judge Hale, as he sat on the bench, and who, as 
it seemed, was willing to give her audience ; but just as she 
began, ^Justice Chester stepped up, and interrupted her, so 
the case seemed hopeless. 

The manner in which the judges conducted themselves, 
with regard to Bunyan, strangely resembles that of the jury 
who convicted Faithful, in Vanity Fair. But though Mrs. 
Bunyan felt that appealing to them was almost useless ; there 
was still one chance, and the high-sheriff encouraged her to 
try it. She was to venture again into the presence of the 
judges, like the poor widow before the unjust judge, to make 
another effort for her husband's liberty. 

At the Swan Chamber, the two judges, the three justices, 
and the gentry of the county, were collected ; and to meet 
them, to appeal to them, required no ordinary courage. Many 
would have trembled, many would have shrunk from the 
interview. It might be the signal for vengeance to fall upon 
herself ; it might involve her in greater trouble than she was 
in already ; it might cause her husband, whom she liked better 
than herself, to be sent out of the country — but there was 
strong occasion for the appeal — her love for her husband, her 
love for his children, her love for civil and religious liberty, all 
prompted her to make the appeal ; so leaving her humble 
dwelling, with a sad heart, she betook herself to the Swan 
Chamber, and entered the presence of the judges. 

It was to Judge Hale that she first spoke : — " My Lord, 
I make bold to come to you again, to know what may be done 
with my husband ?" 

Judge Hale. — '* Woman, I told thee before I could do thee 
no good, because they have taken that for a conviction which 
thy husband spoke at the sessions ; and unless there be some- 
thing done to undo that, I can do thee no good." 



'"I 



MRS. BUNYAN. 5?oO 

Mrs. J9.— " My lord, he is kept unlawfully in prison ; 
they clapped him up before there were any proclamations 
against the meetings. The indictment, also, is false ; besides, 
they never asked him whether he was guilty or no ; neither 
did he confess the indictment." 

One of the justices that stood by, whom she knew not, 
said : " My lord, he was lawfully convicted." 

Mrs. B. — " It is false ; for when they said to him, do 
you confess the indictment ? be said only this, that he had 
been at several meetings, both where there were preaching 
the word and prayer, and that they had God's presence among 
them." 

Judge Twisden now answered very angrily, saying : — 
" What ! you think we can do what we list ! your husband is 
a breaker of the peace, and is convicted by law." 

On this Judge Hale called for the statute-book. 

Mrs. B. — " But, my lord, he was not lawfully convicted." 

Justice Cheater now said — " My lord, he was lawfully con- 
victed.'* 

Mrs. B. — '• It is false ; it was but a word of discourse 
that they took for a conviction (as you heard before)." 

Chester. — '* But it is recorded, woman : it is recorded." 
These words he repeated again and again. 

Mrs. B. — " I was a while since at London, to see if I 
could get my husband's liberty, and there I spoke with my 
Lord Backwood, one of the House of Lords, to whom I deli- 
vered a petition, who took it of me and presented it to some 
of the rest of the House of Lords, for my husband's release- 
ment ; who, when they had seen it, said that they could not 
release him, but had committed his releasement to the judges 
at the next assizes. This he told me, and now I am come to 
you to see if anything may be done in this business, and you 
give neither releasement nor relief." 



284 MRS. BUNYAN. 

Again Justice Chester said, " He is convicted. It is 
recorded." 

Mrs. B.—" If it be, it is false." 

Chester. — '* My lord, he is a pestilent fellow ; there is not 
such a fellow in the country again." 

Twisden. — " What, will your husband leave preaching ? If 
he will do so, then send for him." 

Mrs. B. — " My lord, he dares not leave off preaching as 
long as he can speak." 

Twisden. — " See here ; what should we talk any more 
about such a fellow ? Must he do what he lists ? He is a 
breaker of the peace." 

Mrs. B. — " He desires to live peaceably, and to follow his 
calling, that his family may be maintained ; and, moreover, 
my lord, I have four small children that cannot help them- 
selves, one of which is blind, and we have nothing to live upon 
but the charity of good people." 

Hale now asked, " Hast thou four children ? Thou art 
but a young woman to have four children." 

Mrs. B. — " My lord, I am but mother-in-law to them, 
having not been married to him full two years." 

Hale, looking very soberly, said, *' Alas, poor woman !" 
but Judge Twisden told her she made poverty her cloak ; and 
said, he understood that Bunyan was maintained better by 
running up and down preaching, than by following his 
calling. 

On Hale asking, *' What is his calling ?" some of those 
who stood near, answered, " A tinker, my lord." 

Mrs. B. — *' Yes ; and because he is a tinker, and a poor 
man, therefore he is despised, and cannot have justice." 

Hale (speaking very mildly) — " I tell thee, woman, seeing 
it is so ; that they have taken what thy husband spake for a 



MRS. BUNYAN. 285 

conviction, thou must either apply thyself to the king, or sue 
out his pardon, or get a writ of error." 

On Chester hearing this, he chafed, and seemed to be very 
much ojQfended, saying, " My lord, he will preach, and do what 
he lists." 

Mrs, B. — " He preacheth nothing but the word of God." 

Twisden. — " He preach the word of God !" (and withal 
she thought he would have struck her) '* he runneth up and 
down, and doth harm." 

Mrs. B. — " No, my lord, it is not so. God hath owned 
him, and done much good by him." 

Twisden — " God ! and his doctrine is the doctrine of the 
devil!" 

Mrs. B. — " My lord, when the righteous Judge shall 
appear, it will be known that his doctrine is not the doctrine 
of the devil." 

Twisden (addressing Judge Hale) — " My lord, do not 
mind her, but send her away." 

Hale — " I am very sorry, woman, that I can do thee no 
good ; thou must do one of the things aforesaid, but a writ of 
error will be the cheapest." 

Mrs. Bunyan adds, " At which Chester again seemed to be 
chafed, and put off his hat, and scratched his head for anger. 
But when I saw that there was no prevailing to have my hus- 
band sent for, though I often desired that they would send 
for him, that he might speak for himself, telling them that 
he could give them better satisfaction than I could in what 
they demanded of him, with several other things which I now 
forgot ; only this I remember, that though I was somewhat 
timorous at ray first entrance into the chamber, yet, before I 
went out, I could not but break forth into tears ; not so much 
because they were so hard-hearted against me and ray hus- 



286 MRS. BtNYAN. 

band, but to think what a sad account such creatures will have 
to give at the coming of the Lord ; when they shall there 
answer for all things whatsoever they have done in the body, 
whether they be good or whether they be bad. So when I 
departed from them, the book of statutes was brought, but 
what they said of it, I know nothing at all, neither did I hear 
any more from them." 

So John Bunyan was left in Bedford gaol, to be punished 
for nonconformity. Yea, rather to be weaned from the world, 
and to soar, on the wings of a powerful imagination, to the 
regions of the spiritual and the supernatural. The freedom 
of his mind found vent in words : — 

" For though men keep my outward form 
Within their locks and bars, 
Yet, by the faith of Christ, I can 
Mount higher than the stars." 

Stretching far away into measureless eternity, his spirit 
rejoiced in a foretaste of that happy home of bright and holy 
beings, who in unsullied purity, and in immortal youth, bow 
down before the face of the Holy One ; and as the flood of 
splendour fell upon him, as of old apocalyptic glory fell on 
John, at Patmos, the man of lowly origin, condemned, despised, 
rejected, gave form and colour to the creatures of his imagina- 
tion, and, in his wakeful dream, shadowed forth the progress 
of the pilgrims from the city of destruction to Zion's heavenly 
hill. And so we look upon John Bunyan in that prison home, 
' — his tender loving wife beside him ; he, working bravely at 
the making of tagged thread lace ; his children are about him, 
a little blind girl sitting by his knee, and we feel that there 
are human chords pulling at his heart, and that the present 
life, with its own endearments and wondrous sympathy, still 



MRS. BUNYAN. 287 

binds him to the earth. Among the Meccas and Medinas of 
departed genius, none is more holy than Bedford gaol, — 
we people it again, as it was peopled nigh two centuries ago, 
and think of the noble-hearted woman, the brave champion of 
the brave confessor, think of her as she listened to his voice, 
as she anticipated every wish, and, with joy unutterable, saw 
him a free man at last. Martin Luther said, " One of the 
greatest gifts of God is a pious, amiable, God-fearing wife, 
fond of home ; with whom a man might spend his days in 
peace, and unbosom all his cares." John Bunyan found such 
an one ; and even when a prison was their home, the music 
of her conjugal love gave forth sweet notes, but how many 
chords of the lyre were dumb to the world's ear ? 



LADY A. GOWER. 



Born of a noble family, this lady is truly noble in every 
sense of the word. Noble in birth, noble in rank, noble in 
position, noble in her own true nobleness of refinement, 
excellence and worth ; which, after all, is the best sort of 
nobility, the most revered, the most admired, and the most 
lasting. ^ 

Of a naturally intelligent and rapid perception, her studies, 
close, connected, and systematic, only served to develop that 
genius and talent which she already possessed. Education in 
her case, led forth. — its primary meaning, and its great end — 
and when the time came that she should make her debut in the 
" world," she did so with a mind and heart prepared for all 
that lay before her. 

It is no easy matter to be circumspect and studious, when 
suddenly the trammels of tutelage are over, and the active 
business of life begins. Especially is this the case when the 
business of life seems little more than a round of gaiety ; but 
Lady A. Gower entered the world of fashion as one who 
knew its proper worth ; estimating all she saw and heard at 
their real value, and not supposing that her days of instruction 
were all over when she kissed the royal hand, and saw her 
name conspicuous in the " Morning Post." 

There is no royal road to learning — no king's highway to 
Parnassus — and neither is there any royal road to honour and 
renown. These are not chameleon terms, and will not, never 
did, and never do, and never can, while the sun posteth, and 




Paintea "bT' J. Be 



^n^iaT^l-bTH, I. St 



^/ 



II II IIIIJ IMLII.III.lUIJH8Wi— I— Bl— W^^W^— BPI 



i 



LADY A. GOWER. 289 

the sand runs, belong to any but to those who fairly win them. 
We do not respect a coronet, and thirty thousand a year, if 
these be connected with debasing passions, or wrong principles ; 
and we do respect an elevated tone of high morality, con- 
sistent conduct, and an unimpeachable character, even though 
their owner be as poor as Lazarus. The mind, and heart, 
the intellect and the emotions of Lady A. Gower had been 
duly trained, and called for respect and admiration. With 
talents of no mean order, she united that purity of motive 
which dignifies and ennobles their use ; and, called to move 
in the high circle of life, amid the rich, the gay, and the 
powerful, she never forgot the higher rules of the higher and 
the better life. 



c c 



-^i-M-W^MUJUJlLSI 



KATHEEINE PAEE, 



Katherine is derived from the Greek, Katharos, and 
signifies pure and limpid. It has been said, that in this 
sen.-=ie, it beautifully indicated the character of her, the story of 
whose life we have to tell. She was the daughter of Sir 
Thomas Parr, and the family boasted an ancient and a noble 
ancestry. Saxon blood flowed in their veins. Her father was 
a favourite with the Eighth Henry, to whom he was related ; 
and, as a token of royal favour, the king had presented to him 
a gold chain, and bestowed upon him high offices at court. 
Katherine was born in the Castle of Kendal, Westmoreland, 
time out of memory the residence of her ancestors, but now a 
gray and crumbling ruin, crowning the green hills of Kendal. 

While Katherine was yet very young, five years old or 
thereabouts, her father died, and she was left to the care of 
her mother. By her father's will, she was entitled to a 
marriage portion of four hundred pounds, eight hundred 
pounds being left for that purpose between her and her sister 
Anne, while her brother William was to rest content with the 
gold chain before named. Katherine was instructed in the 
various branches of a learned education, and was of a keen and 
ready wit. Her nativity was duly cast, for Lady Parr believed 
that in the cold and melancholy orbs of night our destinies 
are writ ; and who, in that age did not ? And the prognosti- 
cation was peculiar in its character, and remarkable in its 
fulfilment. Said the seer, " She is born to sit in high places, 
even in the seat of imperial majesty." This fancy haunted the 



KATHERINE PARR. 291 

mind of the child, and when called, by her mother, to the 
embroidery frame, she would say, — 

" My hands were ordained to touch crowns and sceptres, 
and not spindles and needles." 

But Lady Parr was too wise to allow this dream of royalty 
— a very dream of dreams, slighter, it seemed, than the dream 
of the shadow of smoke — from keeping her child from the 
ordinary pursuits of life, and notwithstanding that her hands 
were made to handle sceptres, she learned so well to handle 
the needle, that her embroidery was superior to that of the 
far-famed stitching of the sister of King Athelstan. A wonder- 
ful workwoman was Katherine Parr ; sparing no pains, fearing 
no trouble, counting no time wasted that was employed in such 
feminine employment. As trophies of her industry, a magnifi- 
cent counterpane and toilet-cover, are shewn at one of our ola 
castles, and splendid enough they are. The counterpane and 
toilet-cover are of white satin, worked with twisted silks and 
bullion, a very marvel to behold. 

It seems that about the year 1524, a matrimonial engage- 
ment began to be negociated between Lord Dacre and Katherine 
Parr ; but, as Lord Dacre had but a slender and scantily 
furnished purse, and wanted to marry an heiress, and the 
lady had but little in the way of this world's goods, the match 
was broken off, and not very long afterwards Katherine was 
given in marriage to her first husband, Edward, Lord Borough, 
of Gainsborough. It was a strange out-of-the-way match, for 
the man was a mature widower, with children grown to man's 
estate, and the lady was scarcely fifteen. The marriage did 
not last a year, and Katherine was a widow at sixteen, — a 
lovely, noble, wealthy widow, regarded by King Henry, as a 
" pretty cousin," from whom he was graciously pleased to 
accept a coat of Kendal cloth. 



i 



292 - KATHERINE PARR. 

Before she was out of her teens, the lovely widow was again 
a wife ; and as before, the wife of a matured widower, and for 
the second' time became a step-mother. Her new husband 
was John Neville, Lord Latimer, and with him she resided at 
Snape Hall, in Yorkshire, — *' a goodly castle in a valley with 
two or three good parks about it." * 

During the first years of her married life she attended 
strictly to her domestic cares, and but little occurred to dis- 
turb the even tenour of her way ; but when the Reformation 
had begun in England, and the destruction of monasteries was 
going on, for the axe which wanted a handle had found one, 
and was levelling the whole fair Lebanon, Lord Latimer be- 
came one of the leaders of the Northern insurrection, and 
perilled life and property in " the Pilgrimage of Grace." He 
joined the army of forty thousand rustics, who had come forth 
in defence of the monasteries, and headed the domestic cru- 
sade against the enemies of the olden faith. Delegates were 
sent to the king, and among them My Lord Latimer, to 
demand the restoration of monastic establishments, papal 
supremacy, and the rest of it. The king was greatly offended, 
" that ignorant people should go about to instruct him in 
matters of theology;" so he rejected all their proposals, bid 
them lay down their arms, and accept the royal clemency. 

The pilgrims, incensed at the king's reply, refused to 
receive his pardon, and made them ready for the struggle ; 
they must have perished, for there was not the smallest 
hope of success ; the Duke of Norfolk, who headed the king's 
forces, saw this, felt, and understood it, and employed all his 
efforts to prevent a collision. So the people were, at length, 
induced to lay down their arms, and the king went on with 

* Leland. 



KATHERINE PARR. 29^ 

the destruction of the monasteries, for which, as a zealous 
priest remarked, with more bigotry than sense, he would 
certainly hang in hell. 

The general pardon, which the monarch granted, was dated 
December 9th, 1536 ; and in the February of the following 
year an insurrection again broke out. By the prudent coun- 
sels of his wife. Lord Latimer was, however, induced to take 
no part in it. Some of the nobility who did so soon lay 
headless in their graves. 

We have seen that Katherine Parr possessed some influ- 
ence over the mind of the king. The " pretty cousin" was not 
altogether forgotten by the royal swain ; and when he looked 
on his Kendal coat he would think of her. the lovely widow, 
and still lovelier wife. Sir George Throckmorton, the hus- 
band of Katherine Parr's aunt, was accused of having denied 
the king's supremacy. The charge was peculiarly alarming. 
But Katherine's was the heart that felt for his distress, and 
hers the voice that pleaded for his life. In the metrical 

chronicle of the Throckmorton family we find the following : — 

« 
" While flocking foes to our bane were bent ; 

While thunder claps of angry Jove did last — 
Then to Lord Parr my mother saw me sent ; 

So with her brother I was safely placed : 
Of alms he kept me in extremity ; 
Who did misdoubt a worse calamity ? 

Oh, lucky folks that fawned on Katherine Parr ! 

A woman rare like her but seldom seen ; 
To Borough first, and then to Latimer, 

She widow was, and then became a queen : 
My mother prayed her niece with watery eyes, 
To rid both her and hers from endless cries. 

She willing of herself to do us good, 

Sought out the means her uncle's life to save ; 
^ c c 2 



^^^nB««i** 



294 KATHERINE PARR. 

And when the king was in his pleasing mood. 

She humbly then her suit began to crave 5 
With wooing times denials disagree ; 
She spake and sped — my father was set free." 

The poet rather confuses the chronology of the transaction^ 
by introducing her marriage with the king : in the prose docu- 
ments of the time, we read that Sir George was released 
through the influence of his kinswoman, the Lady Katherine 
Parr, 1540. 

Not long after this, Lord Latimer was gathered to the tomb 
of all the Latimers, and, for a second time, the lovely wife 
became the lovely widow, all the more beautiful for her weeds 
and her tears. It happened that her royal cousin was a 
widower — he had lost his fifth spouse — lost her by the axe 
of the executioner, and was looking about him — a very Blue- 
beard of a suitor, for another gentle Fatima. Katherine Parr 
was at that period beginning her desertion of the church of 
Rome, and espousing the reformed religion. She listened 
to the impassioned eloquence of the apostles of protestantism ; 
Coverdale, Latimer, and Parkhurst, became her friends ; to 
them she gave heed ; her heart was touched, and she adopted 
their creed for her own. 

To her dwelling-place came suitors not a few. For not 
only was she learned and passing fair, but possessed of great 
wealth — two ample jointures, and connected with the royal 
family of England. Gold is marvellously magnetic. It is a 
suggestive thought, that the calf, before which the Israelites 
bowed down, was a golden calf; and that the image which 
the King of Babylon set up, was a golden image. Among the 
gay courtiers who sought the hand of Katherine Parr, was 
Sir Thomas Seymour, brother of Queen Jane ; a very gallant 
gentleman, the model of fashion, the cynosure of all eyes. 



KATHERINE PARR. 295 

To him the Lady Katherine listened ; his scented love-note§ 
were gracefully received, and she determined to become his 
wife, " If," as she said afterwards, " her will had not, for 
wise purposes, been overruled by a higher power." At last 
came another proposal — for the third time, the proposal of a 
widower — that she should become his wife, and the step- 
mother of his children. Surely the offer could not be refused ; 
it came from the king ; from Henry ; inflexible, gentle, 
cruel, loving Henry ; whose heart was always on fire with love 
or revenge. 

" When the king's wife had lost her head, 
Yet he mislikes the life to live alone, 
And once resolved the sixth time for to wed, 
He sought outright to make his choice of one — 
That choice was chance, right happy for us all, 
It brewed our bliss and rid us quite from thrall." 

But Katherine when first apprised of the high honour 
intended her, flatly told the monarch it were better to be his 
mistress than his queen, and resisted all his overtures ; but 
this only rendered him the more desirous of obtaining the 
prize ; it awakened all his old ardour, made him young again 
in his old age, and rendered him ten-fold more anxious to 
enter again the state matrimonial. He was seeking a wife 
when he should have sought a nurse ; but he must needs be 
a gallant gentleman to the end — a hero till the dove-notes of 
passion were changed to the requiem raven-shriek of death. 

Katherine loved Seymour, but when Seymour found that 
he should have to contest the matter with one who held a 
man's head as cheaply as a tennis ball, he gave up, and 
vanished from the scene ; and the lady, with what grace she 
might, assumed the glittering fetter which her monarch 
offered. Cranmer granted a license '' for the marriage of 



^■■»iWWi^^^^^"^"**""'"'B«ii^iippi 



296 KATHERINE PARR. 

his Sovereign Lord Henry, with Katherine Latimer, late the 
wife of the Lord de Latimer, deceased, in whatever church, 
chapel, or oratory he may please, without publication of 
banns, dispensing with all ordinances to the contrary, for 
reasons concerning the honour and advancement of the whole 
realm." 

The ceremony was performed by the Bishop of Winchester 
in the queen's closet at Hampton Court. Her destiny was 
fulfilled — her hand touched crown and sceptre. Did she not 
tremble when the royal bridegroom swore to love and cherish 
her? Did she not think of headless queens asleep in the 
Tower chapel ? Did not the white plumes assume a sable 
hue ? Did not the nuptial song sound like funeral accents ? 
In the old Arabian story the fair Scheherazade marries the 
Sultan Schviar, though knowing all the while that it is his 
wont to marry a fresh wife every day, and cut off her head in 
the morning. A marriage with the eighth Henry was some- 
what after the same fashion, and they who swore to love, 
honour, and obey, signed, in two instances, their own death- 
warrant. 

It now became the object of Katherine to connect the 
links of the royal family. Her noble bearing, her mental 
accomplishments, and more than all, her christian zeal, fitted 
her to play the queen. She made it the business of her life 
to reconcile the rival interests of the family. She had deep 
concern for her step-children, she pitied their desolate con- 
dition. Mary, the daughter of a wronged and broken- 
Jiearted mother ; Elizabeth, the child of a murdered queen ; 
Edward, the offspring of Jane Seymour, had never known 
a mother's teaching or a mother's care ; — to them she was an 
angel visitant, a wise, a firm, a loving friend. 

But her first bridal month — her honeymoon — was em- 



KATHERINE PARR. 297 

bittered by tbe cruel tortures inflicted on those who refused to 
obey the bill of Six Articles, " Turn or burn" was the 
justice of the day. There was no appeal, no help for the 
contumacious. Martyr-fires blazed in the immediate vicinity 
of Windsor Castle, and holy men were burned alive for 
having in their possession a book, which above all other 
books, Katherine most highly prized. Her position was one 
of difficulty and danger, and her enemies were ever on the 
watch to gather up unguarded words, that they might accuse 
her to the king — the stern defender of the faith ! 

Katherine was deeply read, she was celebrated both as a 
scholar and theologian. Eoger Ascham thanks her for her 
royal benefactions to Cambridge, and also for the suavity of 
her letters. Prince Edward, in a letter still extant, notices 
the beauty of her penmanship, and the excellence of her 
genius. From her, Elizabeth and Lady Jane Grey imbibed 
their taste for classic literature. Yet, withal, she never lost 
her queenly dignity in her scholarship. Unlike King James, 
she never sacrificed royalty on the altar of the pedant. She 
was every inch a queen. The dignity of her manner com- 
manded respect, and she held her royal state with more 
splendour than any queen consort who had gone before her. 
Pedro de Gante describes her dress with court circular 
accuracy. When he saw her at Westminster Palace, she 
wore a kirtle of brocade, and an open robe of cloth of gold, 
the sleeves lined with crimson satin, and trimmed with three- 
piled crimson velvet, the train more than two yards long 
suspended from the neck with two crosses, and a jewel of 
very rich diamonds, and in her head-dress many rich and 
beautiful gems. Her girdle was of gold, with very long 
pendants. 

Katherine Parr was an authoress. Her writings were, 



VH^SM^im 



298 KATHERINE PARR. 

next to those of Sir Thomas More, the finest specimens of 
English composition of that era. Her celebrated work, 
written after her marriage, is the "Lamentations of a Sinner." 
Here are two specimens from the book : — 

" Thanks be given to the Lord, that He hath now sent us 
such a godly and learned king, in these latter days, to reign 
over us ; that with the force of God's word hath taken away 
the veils and mists of error, and brought us to the knowledge 
of the truth by the light of God's word, which was so long 
hid and kept under, that the people were well-nigh famished 
and hungered for lack of spiritual food, — such was the 
charity of the spiritual curates and shepherds. But our 
Moses, and most godly-wise governor and king, that hath de- 
livered us out of captivity and spiritual bondage of Pharaoh, — 
I mean by this Moses, King Henry VIII., my most sovereign 
favourable lord and husband, one — (if Moses had figured any 
more than Christ), through the excellent grace of God, meet 
to be another expressed variety of Moses' conquest over 
Pharaoh, (and I mean by this Pharaoh, the bishop of Rome), 
who hath been, and is, a greater persecutor of all true Chris- 
tians than ever was Pharaoh of the children of Israel." 



Again : — 

" Now I will speak with great dolour and heaviness of 
heart of a sort of people which be in the world, that be called 
professors of the Gospel ; and by their words do declare and 
shew that they be much affected to the same. But I am 
afraid some of them do build on the sand, as Simon Magus 
did, making a weak foundation ; I mean, they make not 
Christ their chiefest foundation. But either they will be 
called Gospellers, and procure some credit and good opinion 
of the true and very favourers of Christ's doctrines, either to 



KATHERINE PARR. 299 

find out some carnal liberties, either to be contentious dis- 
putevs, finders, or rebukers of other men's faults, or else 
finally to please and flatter the world. Such Gospellers be an 
offence and a slander to the word of God, and make the wicked 
to rejoice and laugh, saying, — ' Behold, I pray you, their fair 
fruits.' What charity, what discretion, what goodness, holi- 
ness, and purity of life is amongst them ? Be they not grave 
avengers, foul gluttons, backbiters, adulterers, swearers, and 
blasphemers ? Yea, do they not wallow and tumble in all 
manner of sins ? These be the fruits of their doctrine, and 
yet the word of God is all holy, sincere, and godly, being the 
doctrine and occasion of all pure living." 

Henry loved to be regarded, as the most learned prince, by 
a woman of no ordinary ability, and she discovering his weak 
point, satisfied his vanity by her adulation, and thus attained 
over his mind a considerable influence. When the king went 
to France, he made his wife Queen Regent of England and 
Ireland. She entered on her high office with a feeling of deep 
devotion : and there is a prayer extant, which Katherine com- 
posed for the occasion, imploring the divine protection for her 
royal husband and the realm : — 

" 0, Almighty King and Lord of Hosts ; which by thy 
angels thereunto appointed dost minister both war and peace, 
who didst give unto David both courage and strength, being 
but a little one, unversed and inexpert in feats of war, with his 
sling to set upon and overthrow the great huge Goliath, our 
cause now being just, and being enforced to enter into war and 
battail, we most humbly beseech thee, Lord God of Hosts, 
so to turn the hearts of our enemies to the desire of peace, 
that no christian blood be spilt. Or else grant, Lord, that 
with small effusion of blood and little damage of innocence, 
we may to thy glory obtain victory, and that the war being 



■SWPIllP 



300 KATHERINE PARR. 

soon ended, we may all, with one heart and mind, knit toge- 
ther in concord and amity, laud and praise Thee, who livest 
and reignest, world without end. —Amen." 

A woman of rare talent and energy, Katherine ruled with 
moderation and even-handed justice, and, when Henry returned, 
willingly resigned her authority. It was a great and a hard 
trial to her to have her former lover, Seymour, almost con- 
stantly at court. When the king fell ill, and his bloated and 
swollen body could only be removed to un upper chamber by 
aid of machinery, Katherine became the most skilful and 
patient of nurses. It is recorded of her, that she would 
remain for hours on her knees beside him, applying fomenta- 
tions and other palliatives to his ulcerated leg. She cheered 
his ennui by interesting him in the education of his child, 
Prince Edward, a lovely and precocious student. 

But danger hovered around the path of the queen ; her 
known ascendancy over the mind of the king, and her 
avowed attachment to the doctrines of the Reformation, made 
her an object of suspicion and distrust to the Roman Catholic 
party. Henry had constituted himself infallible judge in all 
church matters. Terrible penalties awaited every dissentient 
from his opinion. He was weary of the polemical squabbles 
continually going on, and sought by the strong hand to 
enforce obedience to his will. Several whom the queen dearly 
loved were committed to the Tower, tortured, and burnt alive ; 
among them the gentle Lady Anne Askew. Gardiner was 
wrath that any but himself should exercise influence over the 
monarch. Sir John Blagge, one of the privy council, was 
seized and condemned without the king's knowledge. Blagge 
was an intimate friend of the king, and was commonly 
addressed as " my pig " by his majesty. When the king 
heard of his danger, he immediately ordered his release, and 



KATHERINE PARR. 301 

rated the chancellor for coming so near him, even to his privy 
chamber. Blagge flew to thank his royal master, who upon 
seeing him, cried out, "Ah ! my pig, are you here safe 
again ?" " Yes, sire," said he, " and if your majesty had 
not been better than your bishops, your pig would have been 
roasted by this time." 

But though the king had rated his councillors for approach- 
ing so near to his person as his privy chamber, Gardiner, in 
the words of a contemporary, had " bent his bow to bring 
down some of the royal deer," even the queen herself. The 
queen had been in the habit of conversing with the king on 
theological subjects. They held different opinions, but 
always conducted their arguments with care and delicacy. 
On one occasion, however, the queen ventured, in the pre- 
sence of Gardiner, to remonstrate with him about forbidding 
the use of the English bible. The king grew angry, and cut 
the matter short, but when Katherine left the room broke out 
into a great rage. 

" A good hearing it is," quoth he, " when women become 
such clerks ; and much to my comfort, to come in mine old 
age, to be taught by my wife !" 

Gardiner added fuel to the fire, praised the king's theology, 
and condemned the interference of Katherine as " malapert " 
and " discourteous !" The king listened, his pride was grati- 
fied, his revenge was aroused, and at Gardiner's suggestion ho 
had bills of indictment prepared against the queen, on the 
charge of heresy. Poor unconscious woman, she saw no 
change, she feared no evil, when suddenly, after days had 
passed, one of her waiting maids picked up a packet in the 
royal corridor and brought it to her. The secret was out. 
There, in legal parchment, with her husband's name attached, 
was the indictment. She saw it all. Her fate was sealed. 

D D 



^v 



302 



KATHERINE PARR. 



Her chamber adjoined that of the king ; and when she fell 
into violent hysterics, the monarch heard her cries, and won- 
dered at their cause — wondered still more as they continued, 
and learnt at last that Katherine was dying ! He immediately 
bid his attendants carry him to her room, for he was now a 
bloated ton of disease, unable to move without assistance, 
and so was borne into her chamber. He found her heavy and 
melancholy, and apparently at the point of death. He began 
to evidence some sympathy. If he lost his wife he lost the 
best nurse that ever a man yet had. Katherine testified a 
proper degree of gratitude for the honour of his visit, which 
she assured him had greatly revived and rejoiced her. Henry 
encouraged her with expressions of his good will, and she 
behaved in so humble a manner, that Henry, in a burst of 
confidence, betrayed to her physician the secret of the plot 
against her life. 

Next evening the queen herself visited the apartment of the 
king, Lady Jane Grey carrying the candles. Henry wel- 
comed her as h& was wont to do, with a sort of rough kind- 
ness, and took her attention in good part ; but by and bye 
turned the conversation on religious topics. Vainly is the 
net spread in the sight of any bird. She avoided the ques- 
tions, and when her royal husband pressed them upon her, she 
said : — 

" 0, my lord, I am but a woman, and have all the imper- 
fections of my sex ; in all these hard and subtle points, I 
must refer myself to your majesty, for thou art my lord and 
my head : God hath so appointed it — thou art the supreme 
head of us all." 

" Nay, by St. Mary," said the king, " thou art a gospel 
doctor, Kate ; better able to instruct us than we are to teach 
thee." 



KATHERINE PARR. 303 

" Indeed," said Katherine, " if your majesty conceiveth so, 
from aught that I have said, my meaning has been greatly 
mistaken. I have always held it preposterous for a woman to 
instruct her lord ; and if I have ever presumed to differ with 
your highness on religion, it was partly to obtain information 
for my own comfort, regarding certain nice points, on which I 
stand in doubt ; and sometimes because I perceived, that, in 
talking, you were better able to pass away the pain and weari- 
ness of your present infirmity, which encouraged me to the 
boldness, in the hope of profiting withal by your majesty's 
learned discourse." 

"And is it so Kate ?" cried the monarch ; " then are we 
perfect friends, sweetheart, from this time forth." So stooping 
down, he kissed her with tenderness. 

The day following was that which had been appointed for 
her arrest. The king, supported by a thick crutch-stick, 
walked a few paces in the garden with his " Sweet Kate." As 
they turned the corner of the avenue, they were met by Gar- 
diner, armed with royal authority for the queen's arrest, and 
attended by forty of the guards. The rage of the king knew 
no bounds. Chroniclers tell us, that he uttered such epithets, 
as "Beast," "Fool," "Knave;" and bid the bishop "avaunt." 
Afterwards he struck his name from the council book ; and 
forbade him his presence. 

After this narrow escape, Katherine was more than ever 
watchful over herself. The king shewed many marks of 
peculiar favour for her, and called her " Sweetheart" to his 
dying day. That dying day was not far off. Slowly he sunk 
to the grave ; a huge mass of moral and physical corruption 
— his last acts, acts of tyranny ; his last words, those of utter 
despair- — "All is lost !" 

A very handsome legacy was left to Katherine Parr ; and 



e- 



II 



304 KATHERINE PARR. 

she received all the honours due to a queen dowager. She 
took up her residence at a beautiful mansion at Chelsea, occu- 
pying the pleasant spot now called Cheyne Pier. There she 
was sought in marriage by her former lover, Sir Thomas Sey- 
mour, now raised to the dignity of Lord Sudley. So still 
young, still beautiful, rich, and noble, she became the wife of her 
old love, after having been united to three mature widowers, 
and ruled England as queen regent. Edward VI. highly 
approved of the match ; but the Protector, and many of the 
leading nobility, were greatly enraged, and did all they could 
to occasion the queen unhappiness. But her life was happy — 
happy in the man she loved : alas, that it lasted so brief a 
time, and that within a short period of becoming a mother, 
she should taste of death ! On the 30th of August, 1548, 
Katherine Parr gave birth, at Sudley Castle, to a girl. Sey- 
mour, in a transport of pride, wrote an eloquent description 
to his brother, the Duke of Somerset. But a gloomy cloud 
settled over the picture ; and seven days after the birth of the 
child, Katherine expired. A strange eventful life was hers— 
a life that lasted little more than six and thirty years. 



W. J. AND J. SEARS, PRINTERS, IVY LANE, ST. PAUL S. 



LRpFe'15 



